Mission Focus, Vol. 18 (1990)

March 1990
Volume 18 Number 1

MISSION [7k

FOCUS W

Not a Vacuum But a Drought:

Faith Amid Crisis in Socialism

N. GERALD SHENK

It is a strange time to be taking Marxism seriously. Many
Christians see in various reports of crisis in socialist
societies a decay, a breakdown, a power vacuum, and
perhaps an opportunity to take vengeance for historic
wounds inflicted on Christian churches during the turbu¬
lence of a secular order guided by atheists. The reflections
in this paper reconsider the current situation and its
implications for the work and witness of the churches. The
analysis draws heavily on the author s experiences with
churches of Yugoslavia in the free-church tradition.

Crisis in socialism

From recent headlines one gains the impression that
socialism is in terminal decay around the world, from
Burma to Poland, from Yugoslavia to the Soviet Union.
Economic failures, ethnic violence, and worker unrest
erode the confidence of local peasants and foreign bank¬
ers alike. Newsweek recently proclaimed a “war between
the states” here in the Socialist Federated Republic of
Yugoslavia, highlighting regional and nationalist tensions
that culminated in a central meeting of the Communist
Party under the glare of highly rated TV coverage. Is this
what it looks like, our local newspaper wondered, when a
society first turns its back on God, and then God does the
same to that society?

The crisis has become real, after early stages of pro¬
phetic anticipation and official denial. Taking Yugoslavia
as an advanced example, the indicators are numerous.
Inflation is running at an annual rate of more than 200
percent. Unemployment has not been hidden, and it is
climbing, while productivity is low. Open criticism of
social ills in the press accompany decreasing confidence
in leadership. We see religious activity expand, yet the
stock answers responding to the renewal of quest among
generations schooled for spiritual “unmusicality” 1 are
shallow.

For years Yugoslavia was the model which attracted the
attention of those who hoped for serious reforms in the
socialist world. Indeed, when our personal involvement with
this country began more than a decade ago, it did seem to

N. Gerald Shenk and family concluded a three-year assignment
with Mennonite Central Committee and Eastern Mennonite Board
in cooperation with the Biblical Theological Institute of Osijek ,
Yugoslavia. Gerald began teaching at Eastern Mennonite Semi¬
nary in September 1989, with support from MCC and EMBMC
for an annual return to the seminary in Yugoslavia (now known
as the Evangelical Theological Faculty) each January as adjunct
lecturer.

have the best of both worlds—basic social securities and
personal liberties as well as broad public ownership and room
for individual small business enterprises. Now, however, it is
often dismissed, as if its experimental value was exhausted
after a fling with foreign loans which has saddled future
generations with huge repayment problems.

Crisis and change

We should not accept uncritically the widespread notion
that current difficulties spell an end to the entire socialist
project. To do so, I believe, would limit us in two ways.
First, we might exaggerate the possibilities for dramatic
changes in the religious life of socialist societies. Second,
we might fail to appreciate the long-term significance of
small changes which are unfolding in the present.

Across the socialist world, changes are under way with
far-reaching consequences. Some of these changes offer
the prospect of real improvement in living conditions for
millions of our fellow inhabitants on this small globe. Other
proposals will merely divert public attention from signals
of deeper stress. Loyal and critical opposition may be
allowed to take political form; economic production is
diversifying into more extensive private ownership; gov¬
ernment subsidies in social welfare are being cut drasti¬
cally, passing costs more directly to consumers.

The new willingness to move forward with wholesale
revamping of existing structures, most notably in the
Soviet Union during the 1980s, is a direct admission that
the old order has been deemed inadequate. The search
for new solutions is broad-ranging, pragmatic, and even
radical in considering what was only a few years ago
unthinkable. It now goes beyond mere tinkering with
administrative arrangements in basic production. Like
Yugoslavia, now also Poland, Hungary, and the Soviet
Union recognize that economic reforms must be accom¬
panied by substantial political reforms if they are to
succeed. And this is the point where church folk have
begun to pay closer attention.

Implications for churches

Too much is often made of the impact on churches as a
criterion by which to evaluate larger social change. One
would not assess the merits of perestroika (restructuring)
in the Soviet Union under the ambitious leadership of
Secretary Gorbachev by its benefits (or otherwise) to the
organizational life of churches alone. Yet when a whole
society is convulsed in a crisis with broad consequences,
we do well to reassess to what extent that crisis alters the

1

spiritual landscape also.

Mennonite Central Committee s Europe director Hugo
Jantz reports from interviews with Umsiedler (ethnic
Germans newly arriving from Eastern Europe) that Chris¬
tians who were almost uniformly skeptical about the
prospects for real reform in the socialist system are now
changing their tune. Among recent emigres not usually
known for optimism about conditions in their homeland,
the present situation in their estimation calls for fervent
prayer by Christians that the program of reforms in the
Soviet Union will actually succeed.

Paul Mojzes likens perestroika in the Soviet Union to a
ride on a roller coaster, including both excitement and
danger. 2 Support by church members is all the more
significant when other indications suggest that the room
for reformist maneuvers is not broad. Lethargy and passive
resistance among entrenched beneficiaries of the existing
order may well be strong enough to block many changes
and heighten popular frustrations.

Closer inspection suggests a variety of issues at stake for
Christians. Assuming that the program of reforms is
eventually realized, we may consider separately the or¬
ganizational interests of existing churches, and the per¬
sonal benefits for individual church members, in addition
to the consequences for a society at large. We leave to
others the task of evaluating the overall impact on whole
societies, but the distinction between organizational and
individual concerns in matters of the faith is worth
pursuing further. This distinction must not be overdrawn,
since the concerns are thickly interwoven, but current
conditions of crisis in socialist societies may have varying
impact at different levels of this analysis.

Organizational concerns

Often designated “religious affairs,’’ these are the institu¬
tional concerns connecting state and organized religious
communities. Here we see a whole array of contacts, both
official and informal, touching on legal, educational, eco¬
nomic, and property matters, among others. During the
onset of a social crisis, religious issues at this institutional
level seem to move rapidly toward center stage. Long¬
standing tensions between churches and the state tend to
flare up early.

The prominence of attention paid to disputes along
these interfaces, however, should not obscure for us an
underlying reality of at least minimal cooperation culti¬
vated between religious and political officials. Apart from
the basic ideological differences which divide them, each
side for its own reasons pursues some form of contact with
the other. Public evidence of this process is relatively rare,
but a crisis can bring it into the open.

During the past year, a process of constitutional amend¬
ments in Yugoslavia brought up the question of revising
the provisions on religious activity, even though that was
not on the original agenda for the amendment process.
Might this be the time to negotiate a better deal for
churches? Leading figures in the large Roman Catholic
community declared that this round of constitutional
revisions was not the proper forum for seeking improve¬
ments for the position of churches in society. Churches
would work for adjustment at other levels, while profess¬
ing satisfaction with the basic arrangements and rights
provided by the current constitutional order. (This self-
restraint in favor of stability may have found its most
visible reward in laudable legislative changes in Croatia
later that same year to extend health insurance and other
2

social benefit coverages to theology students, bringing
them into a measure of equality with other students after
a lobbying campaign of more than a decade.)

More generally, a crisis tends to reinforce the ideolog¬
ical autonomy of the churches and underlines the
churches’ stake in the sociopolitical order, unless partic-
ularist interests (such as ethnic nationalism) are allowed
to prevail over the common concern for social well-being
and stability.

The crisis does not keep religion in the center of public
attention for very long. But increased attention to church-
related issues in the early stages of social crisis leads
toward more direct reconsideration of the relationship
between state and society. Issues of church and state are
soon placed in the broader context of society itself. This
move can result in further extension of autonomy from
ideological direction or control into other areas such as
education, artistic expression, environmental concerns,
peace and disarmament initiatives, and (quite crucially)

March 1990 Volume 18 Number 1

MISSION [7k

FOCUS W

1 Not a Vacuum But a Drought: Faith Amid Crisis in
Socialism
N. Gerald Shenk

5 Old and New Possibilities for Mission in Eastern
Europe
Hugo Jantz

7 An Incarnational Approach to Mission in Modern
Affluent Societies
Linford Stutzman

11 Perspective on Mission from Matthew's Gospel
Earl Zimmerman

15 In Review

16 Editorial

EDITORIAL COUNCIL

Editor Wilbert R. Shenk

Managing Editor Willard E. Roth

Review editors Hans Kasdorf, Henry J. Schmidt

Other members Peter M. Hamm, Robert L. Ramseyer

Editorial assistant Betty Kelsey

MISSION FOCUS (ISSN 0164-4696) is published quarterly at 500
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USA. Copyright 1990 by Mennonite Board of Missions.
POSTMASTER: Send address changes to MISSION FOCUS, Box
370, Elkhart, IN 46515-0370.

the legal realm. Indeed, legal protection for the autonomy
of various activities, including religious, in the newly
expanded “social space” beyond the former boundaries of
strict ideological control becomes a central drama, not
usually traced in headline events but monumental in its
cumulative effects.

Impact on individual spirituality

Improvements for churches as organizations do not always
lead directly to improvement in conditions for spiritual
life of the populace at large. 5 If ordinary believers,
struggling for the bare necessities of life, see a sudden
increase in benefits for religious leaders at public expense,
we may anticipate alienation and an increase in criticism
of the religious hierarchs as well. We do rejoice, of course,
to hear that more advanced training may be available soon
for Protestant pastors in Hungary, Poland, and the Soviet
Union. The dearth of solid theological literature is being
relieved in many countries by relief on import restrictions,
and even better, by extensive new publications within the
countries, as Yugoslavia has experienced for more than
two decades now. A flurry of new international exchanges
brings new encouragement to believers previously iso-
- lated from the larger church.

None of these new advantages, however, should be
considered key indicators of the impact of crisis on
individual spirituality. The real test facing the churches in
this moment is in the quality of their pastoral care for
members. Otherwise, given the limited resources available
at the organizational level, existing leadership is in danger
of following the direction of the latest permissions into
endless new auxiliary activities, especially those for which
foreign funding can easily be secured. Ironically, the
sudden removal of restrictions can be almost as disruptive
as an onslaught of new repression. Pastoral care is the
crucial quality which distinguishes the church from a set
of schools, publishing houses, and travel agencies.

The tasks of spiritual leadership require an open recog¬
nition that the erosion of public confidence during what
is well termed the “dusk of ideology” has profound
spiritual consequences for personal and collective life. If
it would be unfair to add to the general instability by taking
institutional advantage of hard times, it would be equally
irresponsible to ignore the impact on believers in their
everyday life.

Suspicion, uncertainty, and interpersonal tensions flare
up as economic and political conditions erode. While
some have the energy to consider new and radical changes
amidst the decay of an aging social order, many are
dismayed and threatened by the extent of changes com¬
pressed into a very short time.

Tensions that mount at work and in the home overflow
into the church. Crisis is said to direct people toward God
again after years and decades of neglect. It can and does
return some people to the churches, but they can be just
as critical of what they find there. Some take comfort in
a return to the archaic certainties of village ancestors and
the unchanged rhythms of ancient liturgies. Others will
not find real solace in the old ways of traditional religious
groups; their pressing needs are not met by the old
formulas for unmoved masses led by unresponsive hierar¬
chies.

Only a renewal of pastoral care can make the church
truly available to its own members’ needs during the time
of deepening crisis. This goal requires a sober reappraisal
of diversions to be avoided and roads not be taken.

Power vacuum: political metaphor

A rapid or extended decline in the fortunes of socialist
society could lead the largest and strongest religious
communities into a seriously mistaken strategy. Most of
them in Yugoslavia (Orthodox, Catholic, and Islamic) have
had centuries of experience with the advantages of links
with secular power. Church/state relations in the region
have been defined primarily by the ongoing struggle for
dominance in secular affairs, that most ruinous aspect of
the European Christendom legacy in both its Eastern and
Western variants.

Under Marxist guidance, these societies have staked
their legitimacy on improvements in the material condi¬
tions of human existence. Economic decline is not only
embarrassing, in this scheme it erodes loyalties and lends
new credibility to social alternatives rooted in other, often
older sources of legitimacy. A decay in the ordering
functions of the ruling ideology, to the point that even its
official bearers scramble to outdo each other in knowing
skepticism toward its credibility, results in a power vac¬
uum that attracts both positive and negative impulses. One
observer terms it “emancipation in decay.”

Reasons for restraint

This ancient struggle over secular power and influence is
a game which churches must strain to avoid at this critical
juncture. The notion of a power vacuum is a metaphor of
political decay, not an analysis of a spiritual condition. The
reasons for caution are several.

First, the churches do not enter (or exit) a general social
crisis with a blank slate. They also have a past and a legacy
of not fully realized ideals. Their own performance history,
after all, includes some of the seeds of harsh, repressive,
even vicious forms which secular reaction took among
these peoples during the twentieth century. To rejoin the
ancient battle for control of society is finally to betray the
peaceable reign of God for a pot of stewed cabbage. Size
factors may protect the tiny Protestant groups from this
temptation in most cases, but Catholics and Orthodox are
not alone in vulnerability toward the perception of a
political power vacuum.

Second, although real changes are under way, the
churches must plan to deal with the same basic social and
political order for a long time to come. It is the part of
practical wisdom to reckon on a fair amount of system
continuity, no matter how dramatic the current crisis
becomes. Those who defend and those who denounce the
present order in strident tones are all part of a single
reality, a social and political complex that will have durable
consequences, however radical the reforms instituted.
The basic social reality for the churches shows remarkable
continuity even through wars and revolutions, as many old
jokes remind us.

Even though a current wisecrack defines socialism as
“the longest and most painful path from capitalism to
capitalism,” neither a charismatic reformer such as Mr.
Gorbachev nor a sweeping overhaul of the social regula¬
tive mechanisms will achieve a magical exchange of one
set of social conditions for a completely different set. No
magical wand is about to wave the forces of communism
or even historical atheism off the map, replacing them
with friendly powers to encourage the growth of churches.
Though we know that no system lasts forever, much of the
present cultural complex will remain, and that conviction
should prevent unseemly gloating over the ideological
deadends of discredited public leaders.

3

Third, the life of churches in these regions is perpetually
subject to the larger reality of endless bureaucratic regu¬
lation. It seems that permissions are required for every
aspect of life, be it large or small. Indeed, the privilege of
regulating the records of such basic functions as birth,
marriage, and death was one of the first to be wrested
from the churches by the socialist authorities following
the revolution. Similar sensitivity extends to borders and
the flow of people, goods and ideas across national and
cultural boundaries. Yugoslavia, even after several decades
of gradual progress toward a more open social system,
retains much of the structure for extensive regulation. This
is an obdurate fact of life for the churches of the region,
and many other things would need to change before this
feature is significantly altered for the churches.

A further impulse to caution for us is the rebuke of
Jonah, who had been content to sit and watch the collapse
of that great city he detested, wicked Nineveh. Having
delivered his denunciations, he relished the prospect of
observing the destruction, yet God had a bitter lesson for
him: even an “evil empire’’ is not beyond the reach of
God’s mercy. Jonah’s mission to that society succeeded,
according to our account, and to his own mistaken dismay.

No refuge in separation

The churches in these lands have long taken refuge in the
rigorous separation of religion from the political sphere as
mandated by constitutional provisions, but this is no longer
an adequate reason for avoiding public responsibility, a
civic awareness of the traumas experienced by ordinary
citizens. As central authorities fall into dismay over an
inability to legislate solutions for urgent human needs, the
churches must seek faithful responses at the local level,
throwing their weight behind every effort at human
solidarity and compassion. Amid dramatic declines in
living standards, the followers of Christ have a new
opportunity to explore the joyful sacrifices of sharing
resources more effectively, even while bureaucrats around
them resort to much resented restrictions.

It is time for Christians to assert with full confidence
that God has not abandoned the peoples of socialist
societies. No matter how turbulent become the discon¬
tents of socialist modernity, this is not the hour for greedy
pursuit of organizational advantages for the churches at
the expense of the socialist system.

We need a double dose of skepticism these days. The
first is taken with journalist reports that highlight only the
traumas, bringing prompt word of potential tremors but
hardly ever noting the “newsless” event when a sem¬
blance of normalcy is restored. “Chicken Little” stories
about the pending crash of a wayward satellite far out¬
number the reports on its uneventful demise in a remote
corner of ocean. In the case of the Yugoslav “war between
the states,” which we found on the cover of Newsweek at
our local kiosk, not a single word appeared during the
following month to indicate that the acute tensions had
been successfully defused.

The second dose of skepticism should be administered
when we hear sweeping claims of the possibilities for
Christian expansion while socialist systems are convulsed
in turmoil. Inasmuch as real improvements for the church¬
es are possible, they should not be trumpeted as evidence
of a defeat for other temporal powers.

At the same time, we must recognize an openness for
change, including elements that are genuine and hopeful.
This is no time to sit under the vine and await the collapse.
4

We have a calling and a duty in every land to offer prayer
support and goodwill toward authorities who are respon¬
sible before God to secure order and protect the innocent,
making room for the goodness of ordinary life. Where
these ordering functions are fulfilled by Marxist powers,
our duty is not diminished by the fact of their philosoph¬
ical atheism or their historic antipathy toward the corrup¬
tions of institutional power in the churches.

Now we observe that communist authorities are losing
the effective sanctions once wielded to prevent believers
from “fanatically” living out their faith. The rewards of
privilege and security, jobs, education, and health care are
declining for all but a very small elite. Believers fare little
worse than others, when all face reduced living standards
and new limits on social services. This, too, can increase
freedom for authentic devotion to take practical effect in
ordinary life.

Conclusion

So before we call down the curtain of history on the
socialist chapter, Christians would do well to reflect on
the enduring impact which Marxism and the socialist
experiment have had on our century. They have placed
their goals on the agenda of many societies—basic social
security, the dignity of human labor, and an egalitarian
commitment. Even in failure, they set the mark against
which other efforts continue to be measured. Churches
will not go far by preaching the virtues of insecurity and
inequality, just because the Marxist project is stumbling
spectacularly near the edge of the stage.

We must prepare ourselves to show compassion for
ideological opponents now seized with misgivings and
haunting doubts. More than depression at the bottom of
a cycle awaits those who place their final confidence in
the benefits of material production. We have never agreed
to reduce our faith to nationalism or an ideology in
competition with Marxism. The points of comparison and
contrast are always available for dialogue, but the truth we
live for is not distracted by cycles of the economy.

We should renew our dialogue with nominal Christian¬
ity, not just at its organizational centers, but in its far-flung
corners as well. We do not know how dark the night must
become before the remaining light in the large traditional
churches again becomes a source of true hope and
sustenance for the unmoved masses. But we Protestants
in the free-church heritage are custodians of a more
intense concentration, for some moderns a more accessi¬
ble reformulation, of ancient truths translated into life.

Rather than a power vacuum opening new temptations
for secular power and historic vengeance, we see in the
religious organizations the withered fruits of a lengthy
spiritual drought. Unwatered by the recognition of God’s
graceful dealings with our neighbors and communities,
whole regions have fallen into a neglect of spiritual roots.
Whole generations have gone long without nurturing that
everyday awareness of the creating, sustaining power that
walked among us in the person of Jesus Christ.

Factual acquaintance with salvation history, the minimal
knowledge that even the average “unchurched” North
American recalls from childhood, has fallen to very low
levels in these parts of Europe. Yet there remains an
incipient awareness embedded within the various cul¬
tures, even a resonance with the things of the spirit that
neglect and counterfeits have not entirely erased. A
recent conference of European piano teachers, meeting
in Yugoslavia, included a presentation by a musician from

the Soviet Union. His lecture drew special attention
because, in contrast to his predecessors of earlier years,
the woodenness of prescribed ideology had been re¬
moved. In its place came a call for a restoration of spiritual
insight in teaching music, a return to the values of truth,
goodness, and beauty. Chief sources cited? Augustine and
Dostoevsky.

There is now more thirst than ever before in socialist
society for a calm and confident effort to put our best
knowledge of truth and goodness and beauty to the test
of life under pressure. Let us have done with dire
predictions and detours into the vacuum of political power
and gloating over the demise of socialist systems. In the
dusk of ideology, a sober renewal of pastoral care becomes
the most attractive feature of life together in faith. In this
task the churches face no serious competition whatsoever.
The drought has lasted long enough.

Notes

1. The literature on crisis in Yugoslavia is extensive.
Sociologist Zdenko Roter of the University of Ljubljana
calls it “a long-wave’ crisis, deep and structural. It encom¬
passes all sectors of societal and individual existence, from
the economy, culture, and education to politics, morality,
and religion. Individual and social life as a whole is
disturbed." Zdenko Roter, “Yugoslavia at the Crossroads:
A Sociological Discourse," Occasional Papers on Religion
in Eastern Europe , Vol. 8. No. 2 (May 1989), p. 11. Cf. also
Silvano Bolcic, Razvoj i kriza jugoslovenskog drustva u
socioloskoj perspektivi (Beograd: Studentski izdavacki cen-
tar, 1983); Josip Zupanov, Marginalije o drustvenoj krizi
(Zagreb: Globus, 1983). On specifically religious dimen¬
sions of crisis, cf. Srdjan Vrcan, Od krize religije k religiji
krize (Zagreb: Skolska knjiga, 1986).

2. Paul Mojzes, “On a Roller Coaster: Religion and
Perestroika,” Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern
Europe , Vol. 8, No. 5 (October 1988), p. 22.

3. These dynamics for the early stage in Yugoslavia are
traced in my dissertation on the public debate of The
Social Role of Religion in Contemporary Yugoslavia (Ev¬
anston: Northwestern University, 1987).

4. Cf. interview with Ivan Prpic, “Drustvo i drzava," Nose
teme (Zagreb), Vol. 32, No. 5, May 1988, pp. 1147-1165.

5. Outlining pitfalls in the study of church-state rela¬
tions, Pedro Ramet has framed a similar question most
cogently: “Should a worsening of church-state relations in
a communist state necessarily be assumed to be welcome
to state authorities or inimical to the faith itself?” See
Pedro Ramet, Cross and Commissar: The Politics of Reli¬
gion in Eastern Europe and the USSR (Bloomington and
Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1987), p. 182.

6. Timothy Garton Ash, “The Empire in Decay," The
New York Review of Books , Vol. 35, No. 14 (September
29,1988), p. 56; the same author’s later collection of essays
on Central Europe is the best current resource for under¬
standing the background of sweeping changes at the end
of the decade: The Uses of Adversity (New York: Random
House).

Author’s postscript: This article originated at the end of 1988,
prior to the revolutionary events in Eastern Europe during 1989.
Its focus of concern can now be applied to the further develop¬
ments in the German Democratic Republic, Czechoslovakia, and
Romania as well The unfolding drama has reinforced the con¬
viction that churches have a crucial role to play in the quest for
peaceful but radical change.

Old and New Possibilities for Mission in Eastern Europe

HUGO JANTZ

The ripples of change of the early Gorbachev era have
become a tidal wave. The question for all Eastern Europe
is no longer if, but when, how rapid, and how profound
the changes will be. Most dramatic has been the punctur¬
ing of the Wall until it has become merely a symbol of the
infamous barrier.

The joy is obvious, often accompanied by tears. It was
deeply moving to stand at the Potsdam opening in the
Wall and see people and Trabis (East German cars)
passing in both directions through a huge breach in that
once impregnable barrier. It is the most beautiful gap in
all the world.

We have seen, in the course of recent administrative
visits, the effects of glasnost and perestroika in the USSR,

Hugo Jantz oversees Mennonite Central Committee program in
Europe, from an office in Neuwied, West Germany. He and his
wife, Katherine, are from Winnipeg Manitoba, and are members
of Maples Mennonite Brethren Church.

Poland, Yugoslavia, and now Eastern Germany and East
Berlin. We have seen it and wrestled with the questions:
“What is our mission now?" and “How should we re¬
spond?"

Responding to changes

It seems that, before all else, we have much to learn in
the face of the new reality. How easily the North American
mentality would lead us to plunge into the new “openings"
to do our strategical thing. It probably involves learning
that change in Eastern Europe does not mean a change
to Western forms of capitalism and democracy.

Among many other things, we in the church, we who
are so consciously in mission, ought to learn to understand
how Christian faith and life, in and out of the church, were
a factor in what is happening in Eastern Europe today.

For seven decades in the USSR and more than four in
the rest of Eastern European countries, Christians and
people of genuine goodwill have absorbed indignities,
abuse, torture, and discrimination. They have lost their

5

families, their freedom, their social and work position,
their property and their lives. What do we know about
this kind of cross bearing and the resurrection that must
follow? Can we take our place beside those who thus bore
the cross—and can we take any effective action—until we
at least begin to understand and identify with the experi¬
ence and the theology that were forged in the crucible of
suffering? Perhaps a major factor leading Gorbachev and
others to g lasnost and perestroika is the effect of genera¬
tions of Christians and uncounted thousands of godly men
and women remaining faithful unto death, not overcome
by evil, but overcoming evil with good (Rom. 23:21). We
do well to ponder such a possibility and to discover its
meaning for us.

For at least a decade and a half, a significant movement
has happened among the intelligentsia of, for instance, the
Soviet Union. Profoundly disillusioned by the failure of
the system, the philosophical and theological hollowness
of its ideology, and the self-seeking corruption of the great
and the not-so-great, they began to seek another way. For
many the way led to Christian faith and the Orthodox
Church. It seems of vital importance to understand that
journey and its effect on changes in the Soviet Union and
other Eastern countries. An important question is: “Why
do the majority of converted intellectuals move into the
Orthodox Church?”

We are told that, especially in the Soviet Union, the
exiling of Christians to work camps in every part of the
country has brought the reality of Christ and the church
to every major population center, new and old. No mission
strategy could have done it as well, we are told. What can
we learn from this, together with our brothers and sisters
in Eastern Europe?

After decades of the promotion and promulgation of
atheism in Eastern Europe, there seems a greater aware¬
ness of God and less of a spirit of secularism in Eastern
Europe than in the West. Has the Spirit of God rushed,
like a powerful wind from heaven, into the vacuum? We
need to learn to understand this phenomenon.

All who have followed the developments in East Ger¬
many have been impressed and deeply moved by the very
visible and audible role of the church. It was thrilling to
see pastors, very low-key, sending people onto the streets
to demonstrate nonviolently, and then to view those
demonstrations, even when augmented by tens of thou¬
sands, even hundreds of thousands, remain nonviolent.
Suddenly, it seemed, the people were speaking, by word
and action, in categories that left armed police and soldiers
powerless.

Some possible opportunities for mission in Eastern
Europe

One approach would be to commission our best church
statesmen, oriented to servanthood, to work alongside
church leaders in the countries now open for such a
ministry. I am thinking of an extended tour of ministry
similar to what Jacob Tilitsky undertook in May and June
1989. Much time should be available to talk one to one,
to small groups, and to gatherings of church leaders, as
they wrestle with being the church in a context of
freedom.

I think we have Christian intellectuals in North America
and Western Europe who can dialogue and worship
together with their East European counterparts and ex¬
perience enormous mutual enrichment. This would in¬
volve the important component of interpreting Western
6

church and society, with all our wrinkles, to them.

In most socialist countries, industry, business, agricul¬
ture, and social services are in shambles. Some govern¬
ments are willing to accept help from anywhere and from
anyone. The church, until only recently ordered to stay
within the four walls of its meeting places, is now being
challenged to become involved in cleaning up the mess
and in rebuilding. The church knows little about getting
people involved, though voluntary service to the old, the
chronically ill, and to patients in psychiatric wards is
beginning to take place. The efforts of the church are
made more complicated by bureaucratic barriers and
inefficiency.

It appears that we could respond to these needs in
several ways:

1. By finding well-experienced, culture-sensitive,
and flexible consultants to work with the church and
government leaders responsible for church-based vol¬
untary service. Such persons might be able to conduct
seminars in strategic places and institutions, e.g., being
resources to people working with geriatric and psychi¬
atric patients.

2. Poland and Yugoslavia might be especially open
to the kind of help Mennonite Central Committee gives
in agricultural development, and MEDA or SELF-
HELP, in the area of cottage and small industry.

It should now be possible to develop a more efficient,
better targeted, and more even flow of Bibles as well as
Christian and biblical literature to Eastern countries. The
euphoria over the “wide open doors” must not blind us to
the possibility of corrupt and unfair entrepreneurial ex¬
ploitation of this aspect of the Eastern European reality.
We need to have people with vision and good business
sense help us with this very important ministry.

It seems almost every institution/seminary-trained
church worker would be willing to accept one or all of
the following resource people to work and teach with their
respective faculties:

1. People who can communicate by life and word
Anabaptist thought and history.

2. People who can help train prospective church
workers and even pastors already in service in pastoral
counseling and biblical, exegetical preaching.

3. English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) teachers.
Because of the dearth of biblical literature in East
European languages, it is an advantage, for the present,
for seminary-level students to learn to read English.

Many brothers and sisters in the Eastern countries could
benefit from spending time in both Western churches and
society and in the third world. Mennonite agencies could
help facilitate this.

We are told there are some 25 well-trained young
Christians in East Germany who would be willing to serve
as volunteers in other countries, including third-world
countries. We believe MCC, for instance, should try with
concerted effort to make this happen. The effect of such
an experience on people who have been forcibly isolated
from interaction with the rest of the world could be
enormous, and the message they might carry back to their
home churches could multiply the effect.

We need also to work harder and more carefully at
finding people in the Eastern countries for the MCC

Intermenno Program. This is fraught with problems, but
we must simply do the best we can.

Some concerns

There are Mennonites in the Soviet Union and in East
Germany only. Should we start Mennonite mission work
with the goal of starting “Mennonite” churches? Or should
we be what we can be to all churches, simply to bring our
particular witness to as broad a spectrum of church and
society as possible?

How do we engage in mission, when almost all of our
present contacts in Eastern countries are with church
leaders whose prestige and authority tend to decrease as
g lasnost and perestroika increase? How can we begin to
relate in effective ways to the new and younger generation
of leaders who are now emerging or are waiting in the
wings? Great wisdom and some courage are called for
here.

An Incarnationa! Approach to Mission in
Modern Affluent Societies

LINFORD STUTZMAN

Why do our efforts of sharing the gospel in modern,
affluent societies have so little impact in contrast to the
revolutionary effects that the witness of Jesus, Paul, and
Hans Hut had in their societies? Are modern, affluent
societies so fundamentally different from earlier societies
that the good news is no longer perceived to be especially
good or even particularly threatening? Are post-Enlight-
enment changes such as rationalism, mass affluence, ur¬
banization, and technology to blame for the apathy?
Perhaps the problem is not so much that society has
changed but that the church and its missionaries have
changed in relation to society. Let us examine this possi¬
bility.

Social location: A crucial feature of the incarnation and
authentic witness

It was not identification with humankind in general that
shaped the nature of Jesus’ ministry, rather it was the
deliberate identification with particular social groupings
within his society which affected how his ministry was
perceived—the impact of his words, how the good news
of the kingdom was communicated, to whom it appealed,
and to whom it sounded threatening.

The location of the Anabaptists in sixteenth-century
European society, although not necessarily chosen, could
be seen as crucial in determining the message, method,
and impact of the early Anabaptist movement s evange¬
lists.

It seems that missionaries of the Mennonite Church of
North America generally occupy a position within society
which is fundamentally different from that of Jesus, the
early church, or the Anabaptist movement. This social
location works as a handicap, giving rise to inauthentic
methods of proclaiming the good news, restricting the
prophetic content of the message, and minimizing the
impact of the missionary’s endeavor on the whole society.
Why and how does this occur?

The strategic approach to mission: Beginning in the
wrong place

The serious missionary, working in what Newbigin calls
the “most challenging missionary frontier of our time”
(1968:20), likely responds to the initial lack of impact of
his or her efforts by thinking strategically. This is under¬
standable. The trained missionary has been taught to think

strategically, and the society in which the missionary
works reinforces the strategic approach to problems of
“marketing.” There seems to be no other alternative.

The strategic approach focuses on the felt needs of
individuals in society and the identification of “target
groups.” These target groups generally fall into two basic
categories—the obviously needy and the disguised needy.

The obviously needy, according to the standards of mod¬
ern, affluent society, are the “losers,” such as the unem¬
ployed, uneducated, criminals, and addicts. They are a
minority and tend to be from the lower socioeconomic
classes. The missionary either seeks to identify with the
obviously needy or to extend ministry to them from a
socially distant position. In either case, church planting
among the obviously needy tends to be slow and extremely
difficult.

The disguised needy are the majority of society with
very real but less obvious problems such as loneliness,
guilt, lack of fulfillment, or starvation for love. The dis¬
guised needy tend to be from the middle and upper
socioeconomic classes. The strategic-thinking missionary
is likely to be attracted to this target group for many
reasons: for its sheer size, for the nature of needs which
seem ready-made for the gospel, and for the prospect of V
building a church among financially successful, goal-ori- J
ented, energetic, and organized individuals.

By strategically selecting the needs-determined target^
group, the missionary inevitably locates him- or herself
socially and from there seeks to adapt the message to the
needs of the target group. Strategic thinking, influenced
by the secular market-based approach, cannot do other¬
wise, for the consumers personally determine the nature
of their needs and select their solutions. Newbigin ob¬
serves: “In contrast to traditional societies, modern West¬
ern society leaves its members free ... to adopt and hold
their own views about what is good and desirable ...”
(1968:16).

This is not to say that the gospel does not meet the felt
needs of individuals, but it does indicate how the message
is shaped by strategic thinking. Tending to weaken the
prophetic, revolutionary character of the gospel within
society, it ends with a message tailored to meet the
self-diagnosed problems of individuals. The appeal of the
gospel is limited to individuals, and any possible social
impact is likely contained within specific social groupings.

7

What is wrong with the strategic approach if churches
are being planted in the process? Australian Stuart Fowler
comments:

The result is that, in spite of having, in principle, the same
world-shaking, liberating faith as the first century disci¬
ples, we ... are not seriously disturbing the world order
of our day as those disciples disturbed the first century
world order. The world has neutralized us most effec¬
tively by containing us within a narrowly confined area
of life in a pact of peaceful coexistence. The price we pay
is a fundamental mutilation of the gospel. (1983:55)

As Anabaptist missionaries we seek to be not only
effective, but faithful to Jesus’ example as well. What are
the alternatives to the strategic approach which enable
both effective and faithful mission to happen, which
enable us to be like Jesus in the world?

The social spectrum: A tool for an incarnational
approach

Jesus told his disciples to “open your eyes and look at the
fields! They are ripe for harvest’’ (John 4:35b). Donald
McGavran urges missionaries to “develop church growth
eyes’’ (1980:185) by doing sociological research. Are Jesus
and McGavran urging us to do exactly the same thing?

The modern scientific method has given rise to a
completely different way of understanding society than
that of Jesus’ disciples. Modern sociology determines the
various groupings within society, not by measuring recep¬
tivity to the gospel, but rather by measuring, among other
things, the socioeconomic levels according to established
criteria. Missiological analysis of a given society’s recep¬
tivity to the gospel is measured in terms of these existing
categories which seem to be appropriate and helpful tools
for strategic purposes.

What is needed for understanding the incarnational
approach is a framework for determining social groupings
according to receptivity of the good news rather than
socioeconomic categories and felt needs of individuals.
The model of society which follows attempts this by using
the criteria of marginality, power , and hope. By looking at
society in this way, it may be possible to identify Jesus’
social location and why it was chosen. It may be possible
to understand where change (receptivity and conversion)
is most likely to occur, not only at the individual level, but
in society as a whole. Finally, it may enable the church in
its mission to be socially in modern, affluent societies, like
Jesus was in his.

Marginality describes the minority in modern affluent
societies that is not integrated into the mainstream Major¬
ity of society for various reasons. Relationships of the
Marginalized are often characterized by individual or
group isolation. On the opposite end of the spectrum is
the Establishment minority who represent institutional
and social power within society. Relationships of the
Establishment may be highly organized and institutionally
determined. Between the Marginalized and Establish¬
ment minorities are the Majority who, although not di¬
rectly involved at the top levels of power, nevertheless
participate in and benefit from it. The Majority are socially
integrated with organic and organizational networks and
are marginalized only from the top levels of institutional
power occupied by the Establishment minority.

Power is closely related to marginalization. The distinc¬
tions are between the kinds of power available across the
8

spectrum. The marginalized end of the spectrum is char¬
acterized by the lack of power to change either self or
circumstances for the better. The power here tends to be
reactionary, survival power which often takes negative and
destructive forms. It may be chaotic and unpredictable
and illicit fear in others. It is viewed from the Establish¬
ment perspective as illegitimate power.

“Legitimate’’ power is concentrated on the other ex¬
treme end of the social spectrum. It tends to be stable and
predictable and is used to preserve the status quo of
society and its institutions.

Between the two extreme ends of the spectrum is the
Majority. Two basic options of power, originating from
opposite ends of the spectrum, appeal to the Majority who
have the freedom to choose how to respond. One option
is for individuals in the Majority to align themselves with
the institutional power of the Establishment in hopes of
maintaining or improving the status quo. This is a most
popular choice in times of prosperity and stability because
of the apparent success of the Establishment promises.

The other option originates because of the apparent
inadequacies of the status quo, the failure of the Estab¬
lishment to “deliver the goods” it has promised. The power
of the disenchanted of the Majority is often expressed in
the form of ideals, visions, and dreams which become
popular, forming the basis for “people movements,” calls
for revolution, and in extreme cases, the use of popularly
supported violence.

The last category, hope, relates closely to the power
choices. The Marginalized at one extreme end of the
spectrum have little motivational hope, sometimes ex¬
pressing this hopelessness in destructive behavior toward
themselves, others, or both. Hope, however, can be po¬
tentially raised from outside of this category. On the
opposite end of the spectrum are those whose hope lies
in the preservation or improvement of the status quo.
Hope in this category tends to be at once conservative
and pragmatically concerned with self-preservation.

For the Majority between the two extremes, hope is
alive, at least potentially, and has two basic options. From
the side of the Establishment comes the enticement of
the status quo and the possibility of progress for society
in general and personal happiness in particular. The values
of the Establishment, with their conservative and self-pre¬
serving bias, seem to be obviously correct to many of the
Majority, and their hope is basically the Establishment
hope of working within the status quo.

The other basic hope option originates from the
Marginalized end of the social spectrum, for it is there
that the human needs are most obvious and the deficien¬
cies of the status quo are most evident. Hope takes the
form of visions for the possibility of a better world. This
kind of hope may result in people calling for fundamental
social change. People movements of all kinds, including
violent revolution, rise out of people in the Majority
category who are motivated by hope of change to the
extent that they are willing to take personal risks in order
to achieve and participate in a new social reality. This kind
of hope of the Majority can potentially arouse the atten¬
tion and even raise the hopes of the Marginalized. This
sharing of hope can result in a solidarity of some of the
Marginalized with many of the Majority. It can eventually
impact all of society. It threatens the Establishment.

Diagram A on the following page represents the social
spectrum of modern, affluent societies using the catego¬
ries above.

Diagram A

The position on the spectrum is not established solely
by socioeconomic status. This is a factor, but in modern,
affluent societies the freedom of choice in the area of
values combined with the access to information permits
movement horizontally on the spectrum.

Major shifts among the largest portion of society’s
members occurs rather easily between A and B in terms
of both power and hope, depending on the social climate.
This can occur without necessarily breaking the organ¬
ic/organizational relationships of the Majority category.
The extreme ends of the spectrum can be seen as being
more static.

The minorities on the opposite ends of the spectrum
have the least in common and, therefore, the least impact
on each other in terms of substantial social change. The
Majority, located socially next to both the Marginalized
and the Establishment minorities, has the potential of
impacting both.

Several additional observations, when placed against the
backdrop of this view of society, will help to understand
how “God uses social forces to bring men under the
influence of the gospel” (Pickett 1933:168). What role do
human aspirations, visionary longings, and utopian dreams
play in receptivity?

It would seem that much of these could be classified as
a basic God-given “hunger and thirst for righteousness,”
a longing for justice, peace, and goodness—in short, a
longing for the kingdom. These longings are fostered

whenever human failure and evil is apparent in society.
In times when the social conditions are ripe, they result
in “people movements.”

It would seem that authentic Christian movements,
beginning with the early church and occurring throughout
history, including the ^ ..abaptist movement, occur when
the Spirit of God intersects with the aspirations of people,
the human longings for the kingdom. These could be
called “people movements of the Spirit” rather than either
“people movements” or “spiritual movements.”

Based on these observations, several hypotheses can
now be made.

1. Jesus incarnated and preached the good news of the
kingdom from social position A within the social spectrum.
His message made immediate sense to those in social
position A, whose hope lay in the possibility for immediate
change. From this position, Jesus exposed the fallacy of
Establishment hope. At the same time he refused the use
of coercive power and violence. Jesus raised the hope of
the Marginalized from a position of proximity. Because of
this proximity, Jesus’ message was at once both popular to
those toward the marginalized end of the spectrum and
threatening to those toward the other end.

2. Although individuals were attracted from both ex¬
tremes of the spectrum, the church emerged from within
the middle category, primarily around position A among
those whose hope lay in the possibility for change and
were ready to take personal risks in order to achieve it.

9

Diagram B

These people were concerned both about their own and
others’ lot in life and were motivated by popular social
and religious ideals. Jesus’ preaching of the kingdom
corresponded to their dreams of change. They were
integrated socially. The church, as it gained momentum
as a people movement of the Spirit, increasingly chal¬
lenged the Establishment prophetically and attracted the
Marginalized by visibly demonstrating the kingdom life
and the power of Jesus’ way. The church, socially in the
same position as Jesus, was the “authentic witness.’’

3. The Anabaptist movement, as with other people
movements of the Spirit before and after, began in much
the same way, where the preaching of the kingdom
coincided with the longing for the kingdom in all its forms,
among those whose hope lay in change, and who were
willing to take risks in order to achieve it—that part of
society around social position A.

4. The temptation for churches in modern, affluent
societies is to locate socially around position B. From this
position the church attempts to reach individuals from all
parts of the spectrum but succeeds mainly with those
around position B. The church in this position tends to
ignore, condemn, or “evangelize” individuals in social
position A. This results in the “fundamental mutilation of
the gospel mentioned earlier.

The social position of Jesus and the community of
authentic witness is illustrated in Diagram B.

The incarnational approach

Choosing the social location of Jesus
It would seem very difficult for the missionary and the
emerging church to represent the good news of the
kingdom as Jesus did in the world without being socially
in the world as Jesus was. Authenticity in witness begins,
then, with the fundamental choice of the incarnation: the
social location of the witness within society. Can the
church in its mission in modern, affluent societies choose
to be socially like Jesus was in his society? It seems that
this is indeed possible.

My recent survey done with five churches started by
Mennonites in the city of Dublin, London, Hong Kong,
Tokyo, and Munich indicates that Mennonite missionaries
and the churches they have started, although all middle-
class, represent radically different positions on the social
spectrum. Some of the positions on the social spectrum
seem to be the result of deliberate choices. This research
indicates that Mennonite missionaries, by consciously
10

choosing to identify around position A, can succeed in
planting churches of position A people, a church which
has the potential of attracting both the Marginalized and
the Establishment individuals, raising the hopes of the
Marginalized and prophetically impacting the Establish¬
ment end of society.

If it is true that missionaries can make incarnational
choices, how can this be done?

Implementing the incarnational approach
Instead of coming to a new field with clear goals and a
strategy to reach them, Mennonite missionaries could
come with a clear commitment to identify with the people
most likely to receive the message of the gospel, and who
can then themselves represent the gospel with authentic¬
ity which impacts all society. This begins by the missionary
forming organic personal relationships naturally and pri¬
marily to people within social grouping A, both Christian
and non-Christian.

Two things are needed to ensure that this occurs:
missionaries who are committed to identify with their new
society from within social grouping A, and a policy by the
mission board which gives these missionaries the freedom,
time, and support needed for the task.

Identification with social grouping A involves listening
and relating from the outset to those in the new society
who could be labeled “integrated critics.” This refers to
those who are integrated socially into the mainstream of
society and at the same time are aware of, and concerned
by, the needs and shortcomings within it to the extent that
they actively seek, promote, and engage in alternatives to
the status quo. The integrated critic is not only already
aware of his society and its shortcomings, he is aware of
the possibilities for change. To be negatively critical about
society as a newly arrived missionary, or a marginalized
person, although common, is hardly helpful. The inte¬
grated critic, as a full participant in society involved in
working for change, can help the missionary understand
not only the problems within that society but current
responses to those problems and the motivating hopes of
the activists.

There are several practical ways for implementing the
incarnational approach to mission:

As integration into social position A within society is the
missionary’s first priority, a part-time voluntary position
with a Christian or secular organization located within that
position could be an immediate goal. This allows the

missionary to begin contributing immediately to the new
society and to be seen as legitimate by all. This puts the
missionary in touch with relationship networks within
both the Christian and secular communities. It gives the
freedom to explore needs and possible Christian re¬
sponses with others who are organically integrated into
society.

The missionary as an individual, and the fellowship as
it begins to form, should join the indigenous Christian and
secular networks and movements which share common
vision and do so with a clear identity as Christians in
general and Mennonites in particular. Both the joining
and the identity are important. Mennonites, with a tradi¬
tion which began in social position A and which has been
more or less maintained ever since, can, by joining hands
with others, contribute to and enrich those expressions of
faithfulness in the new society wherever they occur. These
relationships can make possible a prophetic challenge to
both church and society without being in competition with
indigenous expressions of faithfulness as imported denom¬
inational programs, starting with the strategic approach,
may tend to be.

The goal, in relating to and becoming identified with
* these networks and movements as Mennonite missionar¬
ies, is to participate in a “people movement of the Spirit”
or contribute to the possibility of one, rather than in
denominational church planting. This is not to say that
denominational establishment and growth can be or
should be avoided. On the contrary Mennonites will

flourish as part of a “people movement of the Spirit”—as
will Baptists, Catholics, Anglicans, and Pentecostals. The
point is that the concept of church planting and church
growth, built on strategic presuppositions, seems to carry
with it some intrinsic competitive notions which may work
very well in bringing people into a particular congregation
but may not contribute to the long-range effect of the
gospel in modern, affluent societies.

The challenge of the incarnation

“As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the
world” (John 17:18). Is the Mennonite Church in modern,
affluent societies like Jesus in the world? Are Mennonite
missionaries in these societies taking the unique opportu¬
nity of beginning like Jesus in these new areas? The
challenge is to respond to the call of Jesus, in spite of the
difficulty and cost, to join him where he is in the world.

References Cited

Fowler, Stuart

1983 “The Willing Captive,” Interchange 32: 54-61.

McGavran, Donald R.

1980 Understanding Church Growth , Grand Rapids: William B.
Eerdmans Publishing Co.

Newbigin, Lesslie

1986 Foolishness to the Greeks: The Gospel and Western Culture,
London: SPCK.

Pickett, Jarrel Waskom

1933 Christian Mass Movements in India, Lucknow: Lucknow Pub¬
lishing House.

Perspective on Mission from Matthew's Gospel

EARL ZIMMERMAN

The past century of mission activity has been both exciting
and challenging for the church. It has pushed us into new
understandings both of ourselves as Christians and of the
world in which we serve. It has brought new life into many
Christian groups which had become trapped in ethnic and
social ghettos. It has pushed the church out of its Western
cultural enclave and has created, perhaps for the first time,
a truly cross-cultural and international Christian fellow¬
ship.

This century of missionary encounter with the vast
mosaic of human cultures, social systems, ideologies, and
religions has also made us less sure of our mission. To the
extent that this has been a correction of our cultural
triumphalism and naivete, it has been healthy. One sus¬
pects, however, that part of our uncertainty is also due to
fatigue and a loss of vision.

Authentic mission by its very nature entails vulnerability
and risk. To open oneself and one s truth claims, in
dialogue or in debate, to the many competing truth claims
in our world can be overwhelming. It is in this encounter
that we often become aware of how parochial our faith
understanding is. Our involvement in mission demon-

Earl and Ruth Zimmerman serve with Eastern Mennonite Board
of Missions in the Philippines. Their assignment includes church
development and teaching in the Bible Institute.

strates to us how much our Christian faith is expressed in
terms dictated by our culture. It reveals our compliance
with Western colonial and imperial powers. It also places
us at the forefront of the clash between modern and
traditional worldviews. In this context it becomes imper¬
ative to reexamine our rationale for Christian mission and,
indeed, our understanding of Christian faith.

Contemporary evangelical understandings of “mission”
are often informed by a rational understanding of Chris¬
tian faith, on the one hand, or by Pietism, on the other.
Both Protestants and Catholics have scholastic traditions
that emphasize rational, deductive schemes of under¬
standing the Christian faith.

I recently visited a team of evangelical missionaries who
witness to Muslims in a slum area in Manila. They have a
reading center where they carry on lively public debates
which often draw sizable crowds. Their innovative ap¬
proaches to Islam, however, appear to be limited to
methods of rationally explaining Christianity to Muslims.

A Filipino friend who accompanied me on that visit
insightfully commented, “How can you win them if your
first order of business is to challenge their religion in
public? All you will gain is their animosity.” A serious
limitation was their predominantly methodological, ratio¬
nal, and verbal approach to evangelism. The team agreed
that an authentic local community of faith had to emerge

11

to significantly touch the lives of people living in that
Manila slum.

This is not to depreciate the contribution of the scho¬
lastic tradition but rather to recognize its limitations. A
basic weakness is its failure to account for the cultural
constraints on human understanding and systems of
thought. This is a primary issue behind the debate on
biblical authority in some church circles.

Pietism is making a new impact on the church as
evidenced by the rapidly growing Pentecostal and char¬
ismatic movements. Its experiential, emotional content
meets the needs of many people seeking meaning and
purpose in our rapidly changing technological world.
Surely the experiential and emotional are important com¬
ponents of Christian faith. One must ask, however, if we
are witnessing a retreat into a private world of religious
experience that refuses to seriously engage the larger
world both intellectually and morally.

Where do we turn for answers to our questions about
the mission of the church in the late twentieth century?
As in every age, we return to the biblical texts with the
questions that our involvement in the world has brought
to us. We need to use all the tools available to us to
understand the texts and the biblical theology behind
them. The next step is to hermeneutically reflect on the
biblical message, asking how we can be faithful to it in our
situation. We must also listen carefully to the voices of
generations of Christians that have preceded us.

Finally, however, just as the context which shapes the
questions of every generation is unique, so also the
answers we give to those questions must be authentically
our own. Our theological answers are tentative. We must
be open to new insights as we study God s Word and are
led by God’s Spirit in the task of mission.

Mission in Matthew's Gospel

The author of Matthew’s Gospel writes for a church in
crisis. On one hand, the Matthaean community faces
opposition from a resurgent Pharisaism following the
destruction of Jerusalem at the hand of Titus and the
Romans (A.D. 67-70). After the Jewish defeat and the
destruction of the temple by the Romans, rabbinical
Pharisaism asserted itself as the normative interpreter of
Judaism. The relative tolerance which Christians had
experienced as a messianic sect within Judaism was no
longer assured. Christians were being excommunicated
from the synagogue. They were vying with rabbinical
Pharisaism about who would be the definitive interpreter
of Jewish tradition. 1

On the other hand, the success of the Matthaean
community’s mission to the Gentiles was causing tensions
within the church and made it difficult to dialogue with
Judaism (Guelich 1983:26). The church was being drawn
into uncharted waters. What did it mean to be faithful to
the Jewish religious tradition as interpreted by the Christ
event? Would the influx of Gentiles loose the Matthaean
community from its spiritual moorings? What would the
shape of continuity be and where would it be found within
a context of radical change and discontinuity?

The Gospel of Matthew is written as a response to this
challenge. The response is essentially Christological. 2 It is
the affirmation that Jesus is Messiah; he is Immanuel—
“God with us” (Matt. 1:23). It is Jesus Messiah who fulfills
the Law and the Prophets (Matt. 5:17). He has come
proclaiming the eschatological kingdom of heaven (Matt.
4:17), calling persons to leave all and follow him (Matt. 4:19).
12

The response also has a strong ecclesiological dimension
(Senior 1983:67ff). Jesus Messiah has created a new
“kingdom” community in the midst of the old communi¬
ties. This eschatological community is empowered
through the resurrection presence and authority of Jesus
Messiah (Matt. 28:18-20). It is a definitively different,
alternative community. Kingdom persons are meek and
poor in spirit, they mourn, they seek justice, they are
merciful, they are pure in heart, they are peacemakers,
and they are persecuted by the old communities (Matt.
5:3-12).

The ecclesiological response includes a missiological
impulse. The community of Jesus Messiah has a universal
mandate to make disciples of all peoples (Matt. 28:18-20).
In its very essence it is a missionary community. It is a city
situated on a hill which cannot be hidden (Matt. 5:14). As
an embodied expression of the “kingdom” it is a witness
to the world. The practical consequence, the deeds, or—to
borrow a term from sociology—the “praxis” of this com¬
munity makes it a witness (Matt. 5:16). It cannot be other.

Matthew’s objectives are both apologetic and didactic.
He presents his community as the true Israel of God. This
community is the definitive interpreter of the Old Testa¬
ment Scriptures and the Jewish tradition over against
rabbinical Pharisaism. He also seeks to ground his large
and mixed community, containing both Jews and a large
influx of Gentiles, in the faith tradition of Israel. This
tradition is interpreted through the life, death, and resur¬
rection of Jesus. Finally, he centers the universal mission
impulse of his community in its faith in Jesus. To be faithful
to the Spirit of Jesus means to be a city on a hill and to
go into all the world. The mission to the Gentiles must go
forward.

Matthew’s understanding of mission grows out of his
archetypal vision of the Christian community as the
eschatological people of God. This new community, cen¬
tered in Jesus Messiah and in direct continuity with the
prophetic vision of the people of God, is the locus where
the “rule of God” is manifested in the world. As an
alternative community its mission is an expression of its
corporate life as a gathered people. It is this community
that is a witness to the world, in both word and deed, that
Jesus is the Messiah.

Hermeneutical reflections

The assertion of Christobgy

The fundamental assertion of Matthew’s Gospel is Chris¬
tological. It is the claim that Jesus is the Messiah, the
anointed one sent from God (Matt. 1:23; 3:17; 16:16).
Matthew’s understanding of salvation, of the new escha¬
tological age, of the new people of God (laos theou ), and
of mission is all premised by this assertion. We who would
profess to follow Jesus must understand the absolute
radicalness of this claim.

A friend who works with a Christian service agency
recently asked me, “How is what we are doing any
different from the work of other nongovernmental orga¬
nizations that seek to meet human need?” I think we
would all admit that on the surface there is often very
little discernible difference. Most Christian agencies, how¬
ever, profess that they are serving in the name of Christ.
What does that mean to us?

If our vision of the “kingdom of God” is limited to the
abstract ideals of meeting “human need” and promoting
that which is “life giving,” can we honestly say we are
serving in the name of Christ? I think not. Any humani-

tarian person could affirm the same vision. What, then,
does it mean to serve in the name of Christ?

A Christian who is working at community organization
among the slum dwellers in Bangkok told me that it was
very difficult to find other Christians who were willing to
participate in such work. Most of the people who work
with him either have no faith commitment or are Buddhist.
He shared, however, that the poor are not necessarily
lovable. Persons who become involved in such work out
of a sense of idealism rarely last long. According to him,
it takes either a strong ideological commitment or a faith
commitment to continue. He believes it is at this point
that people begin to ask serious questions about faith.

The question we are grappling with is Christological.
Matthew’s Gospel proclaims that it is in Jesus that the
eschatological “kingdom of God" has drawn near (Matt.
4:17). When we serve in the name of Christ we are
inviting those we serve to follow the same Jesus who has
called us. There is a scandal in this because by doing so
we are making a truth claim that is in opposition to the
many truth claims in the world.

The assertion of the future reign of God
A second assertion, which is closely tied to Matthew’s
Christology, is that the coming of Jesus was a pivotal point
in world history. In Jesus the future reign of God—the
eschaton—has broken into the present age (Matt. 4:12-
17). Nevertheless, Jesus teaches us to continue to look
forward to a future complete reign of God on earth and
to pray in expectation, “Your kingdom come" (Matt. 6:10).

The present age is an interim age of “already" and “not
yet. We experience the good news of God’s reign in Jesus
and anticipate its fullness in the age to come. This
inbreaking of the reign of God requires a radical decision
from us. We must now choose between the reign of God
brought near in Jesus and the reign of the world or the
old age.

It is of primary importance that Christians themselves
understand this message. Hans Kung states:

If the Church wants to be a credible herald, witness,
demonstrator and messenger in the service of the reign
of God, then it must constantly repeat the message of
Jesus not primarily to the world, to others, but to itself;
the Church must accept in faith the message of the
coming reign of God which has irrupted into the present,
and constantly accept anew and in obedience the reign
of God which is already present, God's gracious and
demanding salvific will Its credibility—and no amount
of energetic and busy activity can replace that vital
factor—depends totally on its remaining faithful to the
message of Jesus (Kung 1976:136).

The idea that the church’s primary responsibility is to
repeat the message of Jesus to itself may at first seem
strange, if not completely wrong. However, our under¬
standing of who Jesus is, as well as our understanding of
who we are as the new “people of God," is central to the
task of mission. If we do not grasp and live out this message
our many words and activities will be of little conse¬
quence. Our Christian service needs to grow out of the
assurance that Jesus is the Messiah and that through him
we are the new people of God. As we serve with this
confidence, persons will be challenged by the Spirit to
also make a decision for God.

A fundamental question for Christians today is what

Matthew’s understanding of the church as the eschatolog¬
ical people of God means for us. Matthew wrote from the
conviction that in Jesus a new reality has broken into the
world of human affairs. This new reality is the fulfillment
of the Old Testament eschatological vision of the gathered
end-time people of God.

It is evident that Jesus drew his self-identity and the
understanding of his divine mission from the literary world
of the Old Testament. He especially identified with the
Old Testament prophetic tradition. He based his call to
ministry directly in that tradition (Luke 4:17-19). Mat¬
thew, plus all the New Testament writers, followed Jesus
in this regard. For Matthew, the ministry of Jesus and, by
extension, that of his community, was a fulfillment of the
prophetic tradition.

In this regard a basic requirement for our hermeneutical
task is an understanding of the church as a particular,
gathered people of God in mission. It is this continuity as
a people of God in mission from which all our hermeneu¬
tical and theological reflections must flow. A hermeneutic
which is based on a universal concept of “social respon¬
sibility," on one hand, or on a pietistic privatized under¬
standing of salvation, on the other, is not adequate. The
problem with both is that they have lost the archetypical
vision of what it means to be a people of God. From the
perspective of social responsibility the kingdom has be¬
come synonymous with the world or certain moral and
ethical ideals in society. From the perspective of a privat¬
ized spirituality the kingdom is only a hidden, internal
experience. Both of these perspectives have lost their
ability to offer a radical critique and a radical alternative
to the world of human affairs. This is because they have
no basis of discontinuity with the world from which to
offer such a critique or alternative.

We must be careful, however, that we do not equate
the church with the kingdom of God. While the church
is the locus in which the rule of God is experienced in
our world, the kingdom is not synonymous with the
church. The kingdom must be understood as the full
extent of God’s will and activity. The church is not the
kingdom but rather a foretaste of the kingdom.

Stanley Hauerwas writes:

... it is in the church that the narrative of God is lived
in a way that makes the kingdom visible. The church
must be the clear manifestation of a people who have
learned to be at peace with themselves, one another, the
stranger, and of course, most of all, God. There can be
no sanctification of individuals, without a sanctified
people. We need examples and masters, and if we are
without either, the church cannot exist as a people who
are pledged to be different from the world (Hauerwas
1983:97).

The particularity of the church’s claim to be the people
of God is scandalous to the modern mind. It seems to
militate against the post-Enlightenment ideals of toler¬
ance and universality. In one respect this critique is
correct. By making an exclusive truth claim the church
sets itself over against the rest of the world. This, however,
is not the basic issue. The issue is, rather, how one relates
the particularity of one’s existence including one’s truth
claims to the rest of the world.

The Western post-Enlightenment world has yet to come
to terms with the particularity of existence and of all truth
claims. The belief that somehow one can arrive at a

13

universal and value-free understanding of reality simply
does not hold up under the scrutiny of human experience.
The cultural imperialism which often accompanies the
secular ideal of universality gives ample evidence of this.
We must recognize and own the particularity which is at
the base of all human experience and knowledge before
we can hope to transcend its limitations. In this respect
what is needed is recognizing and repenting of the
triumphalism and cultural imperialism that too often char¬
acterizes our human existence.

The position of the disciples in Matthew’s Gospel was
one of vulnerability. Their position in the larger Palestin¬
ian society was precarious and marginal. Their truth claim
of being the people of God sprang from their relationship
with Jesus and their understanding of the prophetic faith
tradition which they claimed as their own. They identified
themselves as “poor in spirit’’ (Matt. 5:3) and freely
acknowledged their own doubts and failures (Matt. 26:56;
28:17). Matthew’s community which existed on the mar¬
gin between an often hostile Jewish world and a yet alien
Gentile world could identify with the precariousness of
the disciples’ existence.

God’s people today also stand in the dialectical tension
between faith and doubt. We struggle with the intellectual
questions that our world brings to us. We are well aware
of our past failures, of how shallow and arrogant our
relationships to other peoples have been. We are often
painfully reminded of the lack of peace and a spirit of
reconciliation within the church. We are tempted to
misuse power and material things. We struggle with what
it means to be vulnerable, to be a people that identifies
with and reaches out to social outcasts and sinners. Living
on the boundary is often uncomfortable and we crave
recognition and acceptance from the larger society. At
times we are unsure of our mission and of what it means
to go and make disciples of all the peoples (Matt. 28:19).

We have, however, also experienced the inbreaking of
God’s kingdom in our own lives as well as in the world in

which we serve. We know the liberating freedom and
peace of being God’s people. We know the joy of finding
answers to some of our deepest questions. We have
experienced release from the sins that warp our lives. In
the midst of pain and suffering we have found healing.
We believe this is because of Jesus—because his life has
touched ours. In him we have experienced something of
the “reign of God” and of the “age to come.” By faith we
believe that he is with us and that all power and authority
has been given to him. It is in this power and authority
that we go forth (Matt. 28:20).

Notes

1. The struggle between Matthew’s community and
rabbinical Pharisaism is widely acknowledged among
scholars. On this point see Davis, The Sermon on the Mount
(90ff.). See also Nickel, The Synoptic Gospels (115).

2. The fact that Matthew chose the literary medium of
a gospel demonstrates his Christological emphasis. On this
subject see especially Kingsbury, Matthew: Structure ,
Christology, Kingdom.

References Cited

Davies, W. D.

1966 The Sermon on the Mount, Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.

Guelich, Robert

1983 The Sermon on the Mount, Waco, Texas: Word Books.
Hauerwas, Stanley

1983 The Peaceable Kingdom , Notre Dame: University of Notre
Dame Press.

Kingsbury, Jack Dean

1975 Matthew: Structure, Christology, Kingdom, Philadelphia: For¬

tress Press.

Kung, Hans

1976 The Church, New York: Image Books.

Nickle, Keith F.

1981 The Synoptic Gospels, Atlanta: John Knox Press.

Senior, Donald

1983 What Are They Saying about Matthew? New York: Paulist Press.

14

In Review

Liberation Themes in Reformational Per¬
spective. By Samuel Escobar. Sioux Center,
IA: Dordt Press, 1989, 63 pp., $2.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Wilbert R. Shenk

This booklet contains seven lectures deliv¬
ered at Dordt College in commemoration
of the Protestant Reformation. Samuel Es¬
cobar is well known as a Latin-American
evangelical missiologist and leader in the
InterVarsity movement. He is now profes¬
sor of missiology and Latin American Stud¬
ies at Eastern Baptist Seminary in
Philadelphia.

Escobar treats the following themes: the
Reformation and the Word of God; a dual
movement within 19th-century Protestant¬
ism; reading the Bible with new eyes; the
vision from the underside; theology as
reflection on praxis; liberation themes in
reformational perspective: history; and lib¬
eration themes in reformational perspec¬
tive: theology. Escobar covers consider¬
able ground in brief compass. The lectures
serve as an introduction to themes impor¬
tant to Christians in Latin America today.
He holds together the evangelical empha¬
sis on the authority of Scripture and a
commitment to radical discipleship. He
treats sympathetically but critically libera¬
tion theology.

Escobar is a skilled communicator. At
times he speaks almost epigrammatically as
when he says: “The life of the Church is
the ground of every authentic theology.
The Church in mission is the source of the
new questions to God’s Word that are at
the very beginning of theology.” One
hopes we will continue to receive from
Samuel Escobar the fruits of his convic¬
tions, scholarship, and broad experience as
a world Christian.

Wilbert R. Shenk currently represents Men-
nonite Board of Missions as Mennonite
missiologist in the Gospel and Our Culture
project in Birmingham, England.

Sacred Word and Sacred Text: Scriptures
in World Religions. By Harold Coward.
Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1988, 222 pp.,
$11.95 (pb), $24.95 (hb)

Reviewed by C. Norman Kraus

Professor Coward of the University of Cal¬
gary will be recognized by many as the
author of Pluralism: Challenge to World
Religions (Orbis, 1985). In both volumes
he first surveys the positions of five major
religions—Judaism, Christianity, Islam,
Hinduism, and Buddhism—then adds a
chapter assessing possible future develop¬
ments in interreligious dialogue and points
out a direction he feels is feasible. In
Sacred Word and Sacred Text he adds the
writings of Sikhism to the five religions
surveyed.

This second book describes the similari¬
ties and differences in the Scriptures of
different religious traditions and how these
traditions have developed internally. Cow¬
ard emphasizes the way in which scrip¬
tures are used and points out the
significant differences between the oral
and written traditions in each religion. His
purpose in making this comparison is to
provide a basis for inter religious

dialogue. He pointed out in Pluralism that
each religion’s ignorance of the others is
one of the critical limitations to significant
dialogue, and here he attempts to remedy
this shortcoming.

In his final chapter Coward suggests that
future use of Scripture in the Christian
tradition should stress the oral (evocative)
rather than the written (analytical). He
argues that more attention should be given
to hearing, memorizing, and reciting Scrip¬
ture in personal devotion as well as public
worship. Thus religious experience rather
than scholarly theology would be en¬
hanced.

Professor Coward’s own position is that
we be prepared to live with a pluralism of
Scriptures (and religions) as means of
evoking a saving experience of the tran¬
scendent mystery. He urges that the way
ahead will be greatly facilitated by an
empathetic understanding of the sacred
Word that has come through other reli¬
gions.

C. Norman Kraus, former professor of reli¬
gion at Goshen College and overseas worker
in Japan with Mennonite Board of Missions,
is currently living in Harrisonburg, Virginia.

Bible and Mission. Edited by Wayne
Stumme. Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg,
1986, 205 pp., $10.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Ben Duerksen

Bible and Mission consists of fourteen es¬
says addressing the relevance of the Bible
to modern mission. The contributors are
Lutheran rather than Anabaptist, as seen
in statements like “ ‘being born anew,’ that
birth from above, is accomplished only in
Baptism.”

The essays differ in style from the de¬
lightful, practical article by Barbara
Jurgensen, to scholarly research which
may be appreciated by scholars only.

The book makes a strong case for mission
from the Old Testament, although it fails
to address the pre-Jewish era. The New
Testament studies, though helpful, become
rather technical.

While not using the term “holistic,” the
book warns against dichotomizing between
evangelism and social concerns. It also
warns against spiritualizing passages deal¬
ing with poverty and oppression. The
thrust of the book is summed up well in
the statement: “General consensus of mis¬
sion thinking is that God’s concern for all
people finds special expression in God’s
concern for the poor and oppressed peo¬
ple, and that a special concern of the
church in mission must be to take sides ...
with the poor” (p. 101).

Although some readers might prefer a
stronger emphasis on evangelism, the book
provides excellent practical ideas for
reaching international students, ethnic mi¬
norities, as well as urban “down-and-out-
ers.”

Ben Duerksen, former pastor and mission¬
ary, is a teacher at the Bethany Bible
Institute in Hepburn, Saskatchewan.

15

EDITORIAL

The year 1989 proved to be extraordinary. It is certain to
stand out in the history books of the future as one of the
pivotal moments when the world system underwent a
basic restructuring. Astute observers had been saying for
some time that the socialist system of government based
on Marxist ideology was in deep difficulty, but the speed
of its undoing was nothing short of startling.

Since the Russian revolution of October 1917 brought
communism to power, a series of ideological systems have
taken charge of one country after another. These ideolo¬
gies have demonstrated remarkable strength of purpose,
but they have only been able to maintain themselves in
power by resorting to police-state tactics against their own
citizens. Like any other system of power over time these
ruling elites have become corrupt and alienated the
masses. Virtually all of them have been officially hostile to
religion or, as in the case of Nazism, co-opted religion for
its cause.

Twenty-five years ago it appeared we were witnessing
the triumph of ideology. Today one is tempted to think
that ideology is hoist with its own petard.

Recently I read a feature story on Gian Carlo Menotti,
who composed the opera “Amahl and the Night Visitors”
for broadcast on television in 1951. It has become a
standard feature of the Christmas season in North Amer¬
ica. The interviewer asked Menotti how he explained the
opera s continuing appeal both to children and adults.
Menotti pointed to several reasons. ‘In all my operas,” he
said, ‘Tve tried to delve into the creative power of faith.”
He insists that faith is more creative than disbelief.
Menotti then revealed why this faith dimension is so
important to him personally. As a child he himself was
lame. At three years of age his nurse, a devout woman,
took him to a religious shrine and he experienced mirac¬
ulous healing. He has walked normally ever since. Thus
at a crucial point in “Amahl” the story becomes autobio¬
graphical for Menotti. Amahfs vicarious encounter with
the Christ-child world reenacts Menottis meeting with
the Christ-child through his faithful nurse. This is

Menotti s witness to the power of faith.

Ideology has been a strong competitor of faith in the
twentieth century because it promised a new world order
without dependence on the transcendent. The Christian
faith insists that only through the intervention of God can
the cycle of sin and all its distortions be remedied. The
Christian witness is that by faith we are promised a new
heaven and a new earth, not by denying this world or
attempting to escape from it, but by entrusting ourselves
to God who alone can redeem.

Guy F. Hershberger died at age 93 on December 29,
1989. In 1971 he preached a sermon, “Our Citizenship Is
in Heaven” (published in Kingdom, Cross and Community,
1976) in which he identified six things “the heavenly
citizen does to hold the world together.” It is clear that
for Hershberger “heaven” is directly concerned with the
world, but it is a relationship of creative tension, not easy
acquiescence.

First, the heavenly citizen is obedient to the great
commission. Hershberger noted that the great commission
proclaims “the lordship of Christ over the church, over
the angelic powers, and over their visible agents, the rulers
of states and heads of governments.” Second, the heavenly
citizen proclaims the lordship of Christ over the princi¬
palities and powers. In the third place, asserted
Hershberger, the heavenly citizen does not have a place
within the power structure of these principalities and
authorities. Fourth, this is not a call for escape but rather
martyr witness to the power of the Lamb in the face of
hostile and destructive forces.

Hershbergers fifth guideline is that Christian mission
demands a full and balanced response—personal transfor¬
mation and social response—to the whole of human need.
Finally, the heavenly citizen has a “keen sense of destiny”
and lives in hope in a world that can find no hope through
its ideologies and systems. This hopefulness is vital to the
witness to the gospel.

—Wilbert R. Shenk

POSTMASTER: Send Form 3579 to Box 370, Elkhart, IN 46515.

16

June 1990

Volume 18 Number 2

MISSION U±
FOCUS W

Conversion and Christian Continuity

A. F. WALLS

The six ages of Christianity

From Pentecost to the twentieth century, Christian history
may be divided into six phases. Each phase sees its
embodiment in a major culture area, which means that in
that phase Christianity took an impress from the culture
of that area. In each phase the expression of the Christian
faith developed features which could only have originated
in that culture and within that phase.

For one brief, vital period, Christianity was entirely
Jewish. First generation Christians were all Jews—diverse,
perhaps, in background and outlook, Hebraist and
Hellenist conserv ative and liberal—but without the slight¬
est idea that they had “changed their religion” by recog¬
nizing Jesus as Messiah. It remains one of the marvels of
the ages that Christianity entered its second phase at all.
But those unnamed “men of Cyprus and Cyrene” intro¬
duced some Greek-speaking pagans in Antioch to the
Jewish national savior (Acts 11:20), and those law-righ¬
teous aposdes and elders at Jerusalem agreed that they
might enter Israel without becoming Jews (Acts 15:1-29).
The result was that Christianity became Hellenistic-
Roman; the Messiah, Savior of Israel, was recognized to
be also the Lord, Savior of souls. It happened just in time,
for soon afterwards the Jewish state disappeared in the
early holocausts of A.D. 70 and A.D. 135. Only the timely
diffusion of faith in Jesus across cultural lines gave that
faith any continuing place in the world. Without its
diffusion at that time, its principal representatives would
have been the Ebionites and similar groups who by the
third and fourth centuries lay on the very fringe of the
Christian movement, even if they could claim to be the
enduring legacy of James the Just and the Jerusalem
elders.

In the process of transmission, the expression of that
faith changed beyond what many an outsider might
recognize. To see the extent of the change one has only
to look at the utterances of early Jewish Christians as
reflected in the New Testament, utterances which indi¬
cate their priorities, the matters most on their hearts. “We
had hoped that he would be the one ... to set Israel free,”
says the disillusioned disciple on the way to Emmaus
(Luke 24:21, TEV). On the mount of ascension, the
preoccupation is the same. Realizing that they stand at

Professor A. F. Walls is director of the Centre for the Study of
Christianity in the Non-Western World located at University of
Edinburgh in Scotland. This paper incorporates material which
appears in “Culture and Coherence in Christian History, ” Scottish
Bulletin of Evangelical Theology 3(1) 1988, 1-10.

the threshold of a new era, the disciples ask, “Lord, will
you at this time give the kingdom back to Israel?” (Acts
1:6). Statements and questions like these could be uttered
only by Jews, out of centuries of present suffering and
hope deferred. They have no meaning for those who
belong to the nations, whether in the first or the twentieth
century. Each comes to Jesus with quite different priori¬
ties, and those priorities shape the questions they ask, even
about salvation. A first-century Levantine Gentile would
never have brought to Jesus as a matter of urgency the
question of the political destiny of Israel, though he might
have asked about the destiny of the soul.

Those Christian Jews in Antioch who realized that Jesus
had something to say to their pagan friends took an
immense risk. They were prepared to drop the time-hon¬
ored word “Messiah,” knowing that it would mean little
to their neighbors and perhaps mislead them—what con¬
cern was the redeemer of Israel, should they grasp the
concept, to them? They were prepared to see the title of
their national savior, the fulfillment of the dearest hopes
of their people, become attached to the name of Jesus as
though it was a sort of surname. They took up the
ambiguous and easily misunderstood word “Lord” (Acts
11:20; cf. Acts 9:22, which relates to a Jewish audience).
They could not have foreseen where their action would
lead, and it would be surprising if someone did not warn
them about the disturbing possibilities of confusion and
syncretism. But it transformed Christianity.

The second age of Christianity

The second of the six phases of Christianity was
Hellenistic-Roman. This is not to say that within that age
Christianity was geographically confined to the area
where Hellenistic-Roman culture was dominant. Impor¬
tant Christian communities lay, for instance, in Central
Asia, East Africa, and South India. But the dominant
expression of the Christian faith for several centuries
resulted from its steady penetration of Hellenistic thought
and culture during a period when that culture was also
associated with a single political entity, the Roman Em¬
pire.

The second phase has, like the first, left its mark on all
later Christianity. Of the new religious ideas which en¬
tered with the Christian penetration of Hellenistic culture,
one of the most permeative for the future was that of
orthodoxy, a canon of right belief, capable of being stated
in a series of propositions arrived at by a process of logical
argument. Such a feature was not likely to mark Christi¬
anity in its Jewish period; Jewish identity has always been

17

concerned either with what a person is or with what he
does rather than with what he believes. But when Christian
faith began to penetrate the Hellenistic-Roman world, it
encountered a total system of thought, a system to which
it was in some respects antipathetic, but which, once
encountered, had to be permeated. The system had a
certain built-in arrogance, a feature it has never quite lost
despite the mutations through which the Hellenistic-
Roman legacy has gone in its transmission over the
centuries to other peoples, and despite the penetration
effected by Christian faith. Basically it maintained that
there is one desirable pattern of life, a single “civilization”
in effect, one model of society, one body of law, one
universe of ideas. Accordingly, there are in essence two
types of humanity: people who share that pattern and
those ideas, and people who do not. There are Greeks—a
cultural, not an ethnic, term—and there are barbarians.
There are civilized people who share a common heritage,
and there are savages, who do not.

In many ways the Jews and their religion already
represented a challenge to this assumption. Whatever
degree of assimilation to it many Jews might reflect, the
stubborn fact of Jewish identity put them in a different
category from the rest of the Hellenistic-Roman universe.
Alone in that universe they had an alternative literature,
a written tradition, of comparable antiquity. And they had
their own dual classification of mankind: Israel —the na¬
tion—and the nations. Hellenistic-Roman Christians had
no option but to maintain, and to seek to reconcile, aspects
of both their inheritances.

The total Hellenistic-Roman system of thought had to
be penetrated and Christianized by the gospel. This meant
the endeavor to bring the intellectual tradition into cap¬
tivity to Christ and to use it for new purposes; it also meant
putting the traditions of codification and of organization
to the service of the gospel. The result was orthodoxy, a
logically expounded belief set in codified form, estab¬
lished through a process of consultation and maintained
through effective organization. Hellenistic-Roman civili¬
zation offered a total system of thought and expected
general conformity to its norms. The Christian penetration
of the system inevitably left it a total system.

The third age—barbarian Christianity

Hellenistic-Roman civilization lived for centuries in the
shadow of fear; fear of the day when the center could not
hold, when things fell apart, when the over-extended
frontiers collapsed and the barbarian hordes poured in.
Christians fully shared these fears. Tertullian, who lived
in the age of persecution, though he would not counte¬
nance Christians in the army—Christ has unbelted every
soldier, he says—prayed for the preservation of the em¬
pire; for when the frontiers collapsed, the great tribulation
would begin. For people living under the Christian empire
the triumph of the barbarians would be equated with the
end of Christian civilization.

Two great events brought about the end of Hellenistic-
Roman Christianity. One had been widely predicted—the
collapse of the Western Roman Empire before the bar¬
barians. The other no one could have predicted—the
emergence of the Arabs as a world power and their
occupation of the Eastern provinces where the oldest and
strongest Christian churches lay. The combination of
these forces led to the end of the Hellenistic-Roman phase
of Christianity. That it did not lead to the slow strangula-
18

tion of the total Christian presence in the world was due
to the slow, painful, and far from satisfactory spread of
Christian allegiance among the tribal peoples beyond the
old frontiers, the people known as barbarians, the destroy¬
ers of Christian civilization. What, in fact, happened was
the development of a third phase of Christianity, what we
may call a barbarian phase. Once again, it was just in time:
centuries of erosion and attrition faced the peoples of
Christianity’s Hellenistic heartlands. Once again, Christi¬
anity had been saved by its cross-cultural diffusion.

The culture gap to be bridged was quite as great as that
between Jew and Greek, yet the former faith of classical
civilization became the religion of peasant cultivators. The
process was marked by the more or less ready acceptance
by new Christians of a great deal of the cultural inheri¬
tance belonging to the classical civilization from which
they derived their Christianity. Further, when they sub¬
stituted the God of the Bible for their traditional panthe¬
ons, the language and ideas had passed through a
Greek-Roman filter before it reached them. The signifi-

June 1990 Volume 18 Number 2

MISSION [7*

FOCUS W

17 Conversion and Christian Continuity
A. F. Walls

21 Sixteenth Century Insights and Contemporary
Reality: Reflections on Thirty-Five Years in
Mission

Robert Ramseyer

23 Anabaptism and Ecclesiology in a Context of
Plurality

Stanley W. Green

25 How My Understanding of Mission Has Developed
Milka Rindzinski

27 In review
32 Editorial

EDITORIAL COUNCIL
Editor Wilbert R. Shenk

Review editors Hans Kasdorf, Henry J. Schmidt
Other members Peter M. Hamm, Robert L. Ramseyer

Editorial assistant Betty Kelsey

MISSION FOCUS (ISSN 0164-4696) is published quarterly at 500
S. Main St., Elkhart, Indiana, by Mennonite Board of Missions.
Single copies available without charge. Send correspondence to
Box 370, Elkhart, IN 46515-0370. Second-class postage paid at
Elkhart, Indiana, and at additional mailing offices. Lithographed in
USA. Copyright 1990 by Mennonite Board of Missions.
POSTMASTER: Send address changes to MISSION FOCUS, Box
370, Elkhart, IN 46515-0370.

cance of this we must consider later.

Nevertheless, the barbarian phase was emphatically not
a simple extension of the Christianity of the patristic age;
it was a new creation, conditioned less by city-based
literary, intellectual, and technological tradition than by
the circumstances of peasant cultivators and their harsh,
uncertain lives. If the barbarians took their ideas from the
Hellenistic Christian world, they took their attitudes from
the primal world; and both ideas and attitudes are com¬
ponents in the complex which makes up a people s
religion. As with their predecessors, they appropriated the
Christian faith for themselves, and reformulated it with
effects which continued amid their successors after their
own phase had passed away. If the second phase of
Christianity invented the idea of orthodoxy, the third
invented the idea of the Christian nation. Christian Roman
emperors might establish the church, might punish here¬
tics, might make laws claiming allegiance to Christ, might
claim to represent Christ, but tribal peoples knew a far
stronger law than any emperor could enforce—that of
custom. Custom is binding upon every child born into a
primal community; nonconformity to that custom is simply
unthinkable. A communal decision to adopt the Christian
faith might take some time in coming; there might be
uncertainty, division, and debate, but once thoroughly
made, the decision would bind everyone in that society.
A community must have a single custom. It was not
necessarily a case of strong rulers enforcing their own
choice. In Iceland, which was a democracy with no central
ruler, the Assembly was divided down the middle between
Christians and non-Christians. When the decision for
Christianity was eventually made, the non-Christians felt
bitter and betrayed, but no one suggested a division into
communities with different religions. Religion, in fact, is
but one aspect of the custom which binds a society
together. There can be only one church in a community.
And so barbarian Christianity brings to fruition the idea
of the Christian nation.

Once the idea of the Christian nation was established,
a new hermeneutic habit easily developed; the parallel
between the Christian nation and Israel. Once nation and
church are coterminous in scope, the experiences of the
nation can be interpreted in terms of the history of Israel.
In Western Christianity, this habit has long outlived the
historical circumstances which gave it birth and has
continued into the age of pluralism and secularization.

The fourth and fifth ages of Christianity

The fourth cultural phase of Christianity was a natural
development of the third. Interaction between Christian
faith and practice in its Hellenistic-Roman form and the
culture of the northern peoples produced a remarkably
coherent system across Western and Central Europe.
When the Eastern Roman Empire, which effectively
prolonged the Hellenistic phase of Christianity for several
centuries in one area of the world, finally collapsed before
the Muslims, this new hybrid Western form of Christianity
became the dominant representation of Christianity. In
the sixteenth century this Western formulation was to
undergo radical revision through the movements of Ref¬
ormation. The Protestant version of this was particularly
radical, not least—through its emphasis on vernacular
Scriptures—in stressing the local encounter of man with
the Word of God. Reforming Catholicism, on the other
hand, stressed the universal nature of the church, but

unconsciously established its universality on the basis of
features which belonged essentially to Western intellec¬
tual and social history—and largely to a particular period
of it. Both forms, however, belonged unmistakably to
Western Europe; their very differences marked a growing
cultural divergence between the north and south of the
area.

One major development that took place within the West
over those centuries set a challenge to Christian faith as
hitherto received in Europe and required its reformula¬
tion. As we have seen, a necessary feature of barbarian
Christianity was communal decision and mass response.
But Western thought developed a particular conscious¬
ness of the individual as a monad, independent of kin-re¬
lated identity. Christianity in its Western form adapted to
this developing consciousness, until the concept of Chris¬
tian faith as a matter of individual decision and individual
application became one of the hallmarks of Western
Christianity.

This Western phase of Christianity developed into
another, with which it should probably be taken: the age
of expanding Europe. The population of Europe was
exported to other continents and the dominance of Eu¬
rope extended, until by the twentieth century people of
European origin occupied, possessed, or dominated the
greater part of the globe. During this vital period, Chris¬
tianity was the professed and, to a considerable extent,
the active religion of almost all the European peoples.

Seen in the context of Christian history as a whole, this
period saw two remarkable developments. One was a
substantial recession of European peoples from the Chris¬
tian faith. Its significance was not at first manifest because
it was not regular and steady. Beginning in the sixteenth
century, it had reached notable proportions by the eigh¬
teenth, when it appeared as if Christianity might still claim
the masses of Europe but was losing the intellectuals. In
the eighteenth century, however, and for much of the
nineteenth, there was a Christian counterattack, which
halted the movement of recession in Europe and brought
spectacular accessions in the new towns of North America.
The sudden quickening of the recession, therefore, in the
twentieth century took observers by surprise—though
predictions of its extent had been generally accepted a
couple of centuries earlier. Only in the twentieth century
did it become clear that the great towns, which were the
source and the sign of Europe’s dominance, had never
really been evangelized at all.

The other major development of the period was the
cross-cultural transplantation of Christianity, with varying
degrees of success, to multitudes of people outside Eu¬
rope. It did not look overwhelming by 1920; the high
hopes, once entertained, of the evangelization of the
world in one generation had by that time drained away
into the trenches of the First World War. But we can see
now that it was enough. The seeds of Christian faith had
been planted in the Southern continents; before long
these seeds were fruiting abundantly. All the world em¬
pires, except the Russian, have now passed away; the
European hegemony of the world is broken; the recession
of Christianity among the European peoples appears to
be continuing. And yet we seem to stand at the threshold
of a new age of Christianity, one in which its main base
will be in the Southern continents, and where its dominant
expression will be filtered through the culture of those
continents. Once again, Christianity has been saved for
the world by its diffusion across cultural lines.

19

Christian expansion and the sixth age of Christianity

Let us pause here to consider the peculiar history of
Christianity, as compared with other faiths. Hindus say
with some justice that they represent the world s earliest
faith, for many things in Indian religion are the same now
as they were before Israel came out of Egypt. Yet over all
those centuries, the geographical and cultural center has
been the same. Invaders like the Aryans have come and
made their mark; great innovative movements like that of
the Buddha have come, flourished awhile, and then passed
on elsewhere. The Christians and the Muslims with their
claims to universal allegiance have come and made their
converts. But still the same faith remains in the same place,
absorbing all sorts of influences from without, not being
itself absorbed by any.

By contrast, Iranian religion has been vital enough to
have a molding effect at certain crucial times on
Hinduism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam in succession;
and yet, as a separate, identifiable phenomenon in the
world, its presence today is tiny. Christianity, on the other
hand, has throughout its history spread outwards, across
cultural frontiers, so that each new point on the Christian
circumference is a new potential Christian center. And
the very survival of Christianity as a separate faith has
evidently been linked to the process of cross-cultural
transmission. Indeed, with hindsight, we can see that on
several occasions this transmission took place just in time;
that without it, the Christian faith must surely have
withered away. Nor has its progress been steadily outward,
as Muslims may claim of their faith. Its progress has been
serial, with a principal presence in different parts of the
world at different times.

Each phase of Christian history has seen a transforma¬
tion of Christianity as it has entered and penetrated
another culture. There is no such thing as “Christian
culture” or “Christian civilization” in the sense that there
is an Islamic culture and an Islamic civilization. There
have been several different Christian civilizations already;
there may yet be many more. The reason for this lies in
the infinite translatability of the Christian faith. Islam, the
only other faith hitherto to make a comparable impact in
such global terms, can produce a simple, recognizable
culture—recognizable despite local assimilations and vari¬
ations—across its huge geographical spread. This surely
has something to do with the ultimate untranslatability of
its charter document, the Koran. The Christian Scriptures,
by contrast, are open to translation; nay, the great act on
which Christian faith rests, the Word becoming flesh and
pitching tent among us, is itself an act of translation. And
this principle brings Christ to the heart of each culture,
to the points of reference within it by which men know
themselves. That is why each phase of Christian history
has produced new themes; themes which the points of
reference of that culture have made inescapable for those
who share that framework. The same themes may lie
beyond the conception of Christians of an earlier or
another framework of thought. They will have their own
commanding heights to be conquered by Christ.

Diversity and coherence in historic Christianity

If we were to take samples of representative Christians
from every century from the first to the twentieth, moving
from place to place as will be necessary if our choice is to
be representative, would they have anything in common?
Certainly such a collection of people would often have

20

quite different priorities in the expression of the faith. And
it is not only that the priorities are different; what appears
of utmost importance to one group may appear intolerable,
even blasphemous, to another. Even were we to take only
those acknowledged as forming the tradition of Christian¬
ity represented by Western Evangelicals—how does the
expression of faith compare among temple-worshipping
Jew, Greek Council father, Celtic monk, German Re¬
former, English Puritan, Victorian churchman? How de¬
fective would each think the other on matters vital to
religion?

And yet I believe we can discern a firm coherence
underlying all these and, indeed, the whole of historic
Christianity. It is not easy to state this coherence in
propositional, still less in credal form—for extended credal
formulation is itself a necessary product of a particular
Christian culture. But a small body of convictions and
responses express themselves when Christians of any
culture express their faith. These may perhaps be stated
thus:

1. The worship of the God of Israel. This not only defines
the nature of God; the One, the Creator and the Judge,
the One who does right and before whom man falls down;
it makes the historical particularity of Christian faith. And
it links the Christian—usually a Gentile—with the history
of a people quite different from his own. It gives him a
point of reference outside himself and his society.

2. The ultimate significance of Jesus of Nazareth. This is
perhaps the test which above all marks off historic Chris¬
tianity from the various movements along its fringes, as
well as from other world faiths which accord recognition
to the Christ. Once again, it would be pointless to try to
encapsulate this ultimacy forever in any one credal for¬
mula. Any such formula will be superseded; or, even if
adopted for traditional reasons, it may make no impression
on believers who do not have the conceptual vocabulary
the formula will imply. Each culture has its ultimate; and
Christ is the ultimate in everyone’s vocabulary.

3. That God is active where believers are.

4. That believers constitute a people of God transcending
time and space.

These convictions appear to underlie the whole Chris¬
tian tradition across the centuries, in all its diversity. Some
of the very diversity of Christian expression has itself
arisen from the need to set forth these responses in terms
of the believers’ framework of thought and perception of
the world. To them we should perhaps add a small body
of institutions which have continued from century to
century. The most obvious of these have been the reading
of a common body of Scriptures and the special use of
bread and wine and water.

Southern culture and the Christian future

Once more the Christian faith is penetrating new cul¬
tures—those of Africa and the Pacific and parts of Asia.
(The Latin American situation is too complex for us to
consider its peculiar significance here.) The present indi¬
cations are that these Southern expressions of Christianity
are becoming the dominant forms of the faith.

This is likely to mean the appearance of new themes
and priorities undreamed of by ourselves or by earlier
Christian ages; for it is the mark of Christian faith that it
must bring Christ to the big issues closest to men’s hearts.
It does so through the structures by which people perceive
and recognize their world; these are not universally the
same. Affirmations which have been keynotes for Chris-

tians of former ages—or for ourselves—often represent
the application of the Word about Christ to some great
issue of assumption within the culture of time. For Chris¬
tians of another time and place, with different cultural
issues and assumptions, the notes may sound faint or
strange. But there will certainly be themes and assump¬
tions within their cultures which await the Word about
Christ; and as the word is applied, new Christian keynotes
may be heard. Southern Christianity may not possess those
points of reference which made orthodoxy, for instance,
or the Christian nation, or the primacy of individual
decision, absolutely crucial to the capture by Christ of
older worldviews. Pious early Jewish Christians would

have found their Greek successors strangely cold about
Israel s most precious possession, the Law of God and its
guide to living. Many of them would have been equally
disturbed by the intellectual complexities into which
Christological discussion was leading Greek Christians. In
each case what was happening was the working out of
Christian faith within accepted views of the world, so that
those worldviews—as with the conversion of believers—
are transformed, yet recognizable. Conversion is not sim¬
ply a personal matter; when applied to attitudes and
priorities, relationships, and ways of thinking, it takes
generations.

Sixteenth-Century Insights and Contemporary Reality:

Reflections on Thirty-Five Years in Mission

ROBERT RAMSEYER

Three characteristics of the sixteenth-century Anabaptist
movement have special relevance for Christians con¬
cerned about the mission of the church near the close of
the twentieth century. These are:

1. A rejection of creeds and formal systematic theologiz¬
ing in favor of reliance simply on the New Testament
for guidance;

2. The recognition that all Christians are called to be
disciples involved in the mission of sharing the gospel;

3. The understanding that the church exists for sharing
the gospel.

Theology

The Anabaptists had nothing that would pass for theology
in most scholarly circles and their descendants have
shown little interest in systematic theology. I can remem¬
ber feeling somewhat inferior as a seminary student in the
early 1950s because Mennonites did not seem to have
written important works in theology. But is this really
something to be embarrassed about? Does lack of interest
in systematic theology necessarily imply lack of thoughtful
reflection on the Christian faith and what it means to be
a Christian?

In mission today, “contextualization” looms large. The
process of contextualization involves going back to the
starting point, and for the Anabaptists the starting point
was Jesus Christ as he is seen in the Scriptures. The
Anabaptists took the Scriptures as their guide and looked
there for contemporary guidance. They were con¬
textualizing, looking for guidance for living as Christian
disciples in their contemporary setting. Christians contex¬
tualize in order to be able to live as Christians where they
are. This is also what theology ought to be all about. That

Robert and Alice Ruth Ramseyer are overseas workers with the
General Conference Mennonite Church Commission on Overseas
Mission. This article is a revision of a paper presented in Japanese
to the Anabaptist Seminar sponsored by the Japan Mennonite
Fellowship in Shimonoseki, Japan , in November 1988. The original
title was “Saisenreiha no Isan to Konnichi no Fukuin Senkyo (The
Anabaptist Legacy and Mission Today).”

is, the real purpose of theology is not to provide a
comprehensive system for answering all possible questions
about God, but rather to provide a map for Christian living.
If theology is a map, obviously it needs to be redone for
every time and place, for each situation. Moreover, a map
need not include everything but only those things which
people need to know in order to find their way.

Theology as a map has basically two purposes: (1) The
church needs maps to help it share the good news about
Jesus Christ with people who do not yet know him. It
needs maps to guide that sharing so that people can see
that the good news really is good news for them. These
maps have to respond to people who are not yet con¬
sciously following Jesus Christ, respond to them in the real
world in which they live. (2) Maps are also important to
help us live as Jesus’ disciples and to enable the church
to be the church in today’s world. We need maps to guide
us in our lives as individual disciples and to help the
church see its role in society today, maps which are
specifically focused on the concrete situations in which
we live and work.

Map-type theology, contextualized theology, whether it
be for sharing the good news with people who are not yet
disciples or for guiding disciples in their daily lives,
focuses on the actual situations in which people live. It
follows then that, when the church goes out in mission, it
is important not to go out with prepackaged theological
statements, but to go out with the Bible and to sit down
with Christians where they are to work out appropriate
expressions of the Christian faith for that time and place.
For this reason we can be grateful that the Anabaptists
were not theologians in the traditional sense, theologians
who tried to work out statements which would be valid
for all times and places.

Obviously no one goes into mission with no precon¬
ceived ideas about the Christian faith and life. No one
goes with “only the Bible.’’ We go with understandings
which reflect our own histories and situations. However,
in mission we are called to consciously work at refocusing,
to work on the development of new maps which can guide
people in this new (to us) setting. In mission this work of

21

refocusing begins when people sit down and read the New
Testament together, asking what this means for people in
their communities where they live. Obviously, the use of
imported theological statements impedes that refocusing
task.

No matter where they may be, Christians will always be
pilgrims and strangers, never able to fully blend with the
society around them. However, we need to be sure that
we are strangers for the right reasons, strangers because
we follow Jesus, not because we follow some theology
imported from another time and place. Following an
imported theology is like using a London map to find a
house in Tokyo, or like using a sixteenth century map of
Hiroshima to find a home there today. It simply will not
work. Jesus is our guide, and theology is to help us follow
him. It has no other reason for existence.

The Christian church in Japan is not at home in the
society around it, and it should not be. However, we need
to be sure that the strangeness of the church comes from
following Jesus Christ and not from following a theology
brought by missionaries. The church in Japan today is a
church of strangers and pilgrims—strangers and pilgrims
because it has studied the Bible and listened to the voice
of Jesus from the midst of Japanese society. Where are
the theological maps of the Mennonite and Brethren in
Christ churches in Japan today actually focused? Have
Mennonite and Brethren in Christ Christians been free
to refocus the theologies which the first missionaries
brought from North America? Is our so-called Anabaptist
theology actually only a twentieth-century systemization
of sixteenth-century ideas and practices? Is our so-called
evangelical theology focused on our situation today or is
it still focused on nineteenth- and twentieth-century
North America?

Our task today is to go back once again to the beginning,
back to the good news about Jesus, and to ask what this
means for the world in which we live today. Going back
to the beginning does not mean ignoring two thousand
years of Christian theologizing; there is a great deal that
we can learn from that history. Rather, we are called to
return to the beginning in the light of that history.

The issue for the church in Japan, and in the rest of the
world, is whether we have the courage to do that or
whether we will remain captives of theological maps
prepared for other times and places. This will require
courage, but without it the church’s mission of gospel
sharing cannot be carried out in Japan or anywhere else.
It is this courage which is part of the legacy of those
sixteenth-century Anabaptists.

Disciples

When the Anabaptists shared the gospel, their objective
was not gaining passive converts, but making active
disciples of Jesus Christ, disciples who themselves would
live to share the gospel with others. Those sixteenth-cen¬
tury Christians took Matthew 28:18-20 seriously, believing
that this was what Jesus had called them to do. They
believed that all Christians in all times and places are
called to make disciples.

Today the term “disciple” is often misunderstood as
meaning a special class of superior Christians. There are
ordinary Christians and there are disciples. However,
“disciple” simply means one who is learning, learning from
a teacher to whom one is committed. Jesus’ disciples are
those who are committed to learning from him, people
who want to live in his way. Disciples believe that the way
22

Jesus taught us to live is not an impossible ideal but a way
that is both possible and desirable.

Discipleship often becomes confusingly involved in the
traditional Protestant argument about faith and works.
That is, when discipleship is stressed there are those who
say, “You are trying to earn your salvation through good
works.” This reaction indicates a profound lack of under¬
standing of what faith is. Unfortunately, many of those
who think of themselves as spiritual descendants of the
Anabaptists have been led into this misunderstanding.
Faith is our link with God, our tie of conscious depen¬
dence on God. In faith we admit that Jesus Christ knows
far better than we what is good for us and what is harmful.
Discipleship, trying to walk in the way that Jesus showed
and taught, is simply the result of the fact that we believe
walking in the way Jesus showed and taught really is the
best way for us to live. Faith is our tie to Jesus Christ, and
the way that we live in discipleship is the concrete
expression of that faith.

If we are disciples we share in the commission that Jesus
gave to his disciples: As the Father sent me, so I send you
(John 20:21). Our mission is the same as Jesus’ mission,
and he is our model for that mission. Jesus is also our model
for how the gospel is to be shared. Jesus teaches us the
ways, the methods, by which the good news is to be shared.

One of the most important issues in mission today is the
issue of priorities. A great deal has been written about the
relative priority of (1) evangelism; (2) helping people with
physical needs; and (3) working for the freeing of the
oppressed. Jesus, however, responded to the needs of the
people in whose presence he ministered without setting
arbitrary priorities. He helped people where they needed
help without apparent reference to where this stood on a
list of ultimate priorities. Or perhaps it would be more
accurate to say that for Jesus, helping people where they
needed help was always the number one priority. If we
are Jesus’ disciples, then he is our example in this as well.

Communication studies have shown that the way a
message is communicated has a profound effect on how
that message will be understood. In Jesus’ case, as the
incarnate Word of God, there was complete unity be¬
tween the good news which was shared, the sharer of that
good news, and the way that it was shared. This is the
example toward which we strive. Jesus’ way of sharing the
gospel was no accident but the way demanded by the
content of the good news itself. In sharing the good news,
Jesus rejected all claims to what is usually called power
in human society. He rejected social power, economic
power, technological power, and the power that comes
with education. Instead, he became a servant and built
relationships of love from that position, relationships along
with which the good news could be shared.

What about the church in Japan? Too often we early
Mennonite and Brethren in Christ missionaries in Japan
had the traditional Protestant understanding that disciples
are a special class of extra-mature Christians and that
discipleship is too much to ask of new Christians. First
new Christians receive Jesus in their hearts and then, as
they are taught more, they may become ready to become
disciples. The result can be seen in the development and
growth of Mennonite and Brethren in Christ churches in
Japan. In the beginning many people confessed their faith
in Jesus and joined the church. At the same time many
new Christians left the church. They had joined an
interesting new religion for a time but had not made a
commitment to becoming lifelong disciples of Jesus Christ.

Even today many church members consider Jesus’ way
one religion among others, a way which gives comfort and
encouragement to the individual, but they have never
understood it as a radically transforming, lifelong commit¬
ment. In too many cases our evangelism has been based
on a traditional Protestant, rather than an Anabaptist,
understanding of the gospel. The present plateauing of
growth in the church in Japan is a direct result.

Can we move from passive believers to disciples, aggres¬
sively engaged in mission? Once again this will take
courage, and there will be those who leave the church in
the process.

The church

What about the church which exists for mission? The
sixteenth-century Anabaptists tried to re-create in their
century the church which they saw in the New Testament.
Obviously there is no single model for the church in the
New Testament. However, although there are several
models, one thing is clear. The New Testament church
was not simply one social organization among others. The
church in the New Testament was more like family,
community, a living, vital organism. The church really is
the living, active body of Christ. In the midst of sixteenth-
century European society, the Anabaptists recovered this
vision of the church and worked at building a church
bound together by love in which members really tried to
help each other, a church in which all were brothers and
sisters without hierarchical distinctions.

That church actively engaged in mission. It was orga¬
nized for mission. A church which was not interested in
sharing the good news would have been inconceivable to
those first Anabaptists. The loving fellowship of the church
was attractive to people outside the church and drew them
in. The fellowship of the church was living testimony to
the good news, the concrete expression of the gospel. For
both the New Testament church and the Anabaptists,
evangelism was never a matter of words only; the witness

of the gospel was a witness which could be seen and
experienced. In the church the gospel was made concrete.

When Mennonite and Brethren in Christ missionaries
first came to Japan they organized themselves as missions.
Probably the principal reason was that missionaries had
done this wherever they went around the world. This was,
of course, an organization separate from the church which
was planted. It was natural, then, that church and mission
came to be seen as organizations with different purposes,
and since this “mission’’ was an organization of missionar¬
ies its purpose was clearly mission. The purpose of the
church then necessarily lay elsewhere.

In addition, since the church in Japan was perceived to
be a religious organization, its position in the lives of
Christians was limited to what was understood to be the
religious dimension of life. This has meant that in the lives
of many church members there are things more important
than the church, and that in some cases when a problem
arises in a member’s life, the member has chosen to leave
the church.

However, in spite of all the mistakes and misunderstand¬
ings and, in a very real sense, because of these mistakes
and misunderstandings, there are living, active Mennonite
and Brethren in Christ congregations in Japan today.
There are dedicated, committed disciples of Jesus Christ
in these congregations. God’s love is apparent in the
fellowship of these churches, and the gospel of Jesus
Christ is concretely visible.

In Japan, as around the world, we are called to study
the experience of the church, to learn from that experi¬
ence, and to go forward in faith. The Anabaptist legacy
lies in the faith and knowledge that no matter where we
are, no matter how difficult our circumstances may be, it
is possible to live as disciples of Jesus Christ carrying on
his mission in the world.

Jesus’ disciples can be found in Japan and around the
world. The church which is his group of disciples is here.
We can look forward in faith to the growth of his church.

Anabaptism and Ecclesiology in a Context of Plurality

STANLEY W. GREEN

We live at a significant juncture in the history of the
world—the final decade before the millennium. All
around the world events occur at a dizzying pace, spurred,
no doubt, by technological advancements. These changes,
the technological advances, and the portentous signifi¬
cance of the advancing new millennium have given new
impetus to the church’s missionary calling. Strategies for
reaching the lost and unchurched by A.D. 2000 multiply
at a bewildering rate. Alongside other denominational
plans, the Mennonite Church has its Vision 95 goals and
the General Conference Mennonites have their Kingdom
Commitments.

The massive migration of people to the cities, often
across national, cultural, and ethnic boundaries, makes the
city a mosaic of human diversity. We celebrate the

Stanley W. Green is pastor of Faith Mennonite Church , Vice-Pres¬
ident of the Council of Anabaptists in Los Angeles , and a PhD.
student at Fuller Theological Seminary.

opportunity this presents for reaching people who live on
our doorstep with the gospel. This same fortuitous circum¬
stance, which we believe is providential in the purposes
of God, also brings certain tensions. A chief tension is
associated with our evangelistic concern to expand the
church and our desire to be faithful to the church’s
reconciling character—which is no less evangelistic, even
if not immediately apparent. It is important to affirm early
on that the church has a mandate to grow.

Growth is vital for the health and well-being of the
church. The earliest fruit of the Spirit’s ministry in the
church was evidenced by its phenomenal growth. The first
historical records of the Christian church celebrate the
rapid growth of the apostolic church. It seems important,
even imperative, as faithful and responsible stewards that
we identify the most effective means to reach the multi¬
tudes who are part of the great harvest still to be reaped,
according to the desire of the Savior (Matt. 9:37-38).

23

In recent years, many of those who are enthusiastic
about our evangelistic imperative and who try sincerely
to be faithful to the church’s commission to “disciple the
nations” (Matt. 28:19) have espoused what is known as
the “homogeneous unit” or “people group” approach.
Though the intense debate regarding this approach has
died down, there continues to be a quiet implementation
of homogeneous groupings with tragic consequence for
church and society.

To be sure, there are many positive and valuable features
to this particular approach. It affirms the value of cultural
distinctives. It posits that a convert should not be expected
to renounce or alienate himself from his cultural heritage.
It asserts correctly that to ignore a people’s language,
culture, traditions, and identity as if these were valueless
or nonexistent is wrong. In the same vein it suggests that
the gospel’s progress is facilitated by moving along natural
human lines. Unfortunately, the consequence of this
approach is that churches tend to be comprised of a single
ethnic, linguistic, cultural group. This should not be the
case in the long run. In time the church must recognize
that its true nature is to reflect the new reality of the
kingdom where all natural and human barriers are demol¬
ished. This reality will come in time through the process
of nurture. It is important not to place any obstacles in
the way of persons coming to Christ in order to facilitate
the numerical growth of the church.

While we as Anabaptists must be equally enthusiastic
about the numerical growth of the church and our desire
to be faithful to the calling entrusted to us, we need to
affirm certain considerations which we feel are indispens¬
able to the integrity of the church.

Pragmatism and methods

For Anabaptists, pragmatism has never been an important
part of our heritage. If it were, we would never have the
legacy of martyrdom as witnessed to in the Martyrs Mirror.
For Anabaptists the end has never justified the means.
Scripture has always been the locus for our appeal to
authority. It is here, in God’s will as revealed in the
authoritative Word, that we find our ultimate and only
justification for the methods we use in reaching the world.
Pragmatism suggests the usability of a particular strategy
as long as, and especially if, it works well. The difficulty
with this approach is that the church is often seen as an
end in itself. Against that unwarranted perception, the
Scripture witnesses that we are not called to preach the
church but to announce the kingdom of God, a central
motif and a pervasive preoccupation of Jesus’ teaching
and ministry. In fact, it is the first word from Jesus’ lips
according to the earliest Gospel (Mark 1:25).

The true nature of the church

Anabaptist ecclesiology has always affirmed the church’s
identity as the kingdom community. Both in its task and
in its place in God’s cosmic design, the church is called
to be a genuinely redeemed and redeeming community.
As a discipled community the church is committed to a
pattern of corporate life which is a rejection of, and at the
same time a challenge to, the social configurations of the
world. The coming of the kingdom of God is seen only to
the extent that the church grows and expands while at the
same time demonstrating true Christian community —for
the church as Christian community is a microcosm of
God’s cosmic reconciliation (Col. 1:20). Others retort that
such reconciliation is the consequence of nurture and
24

should not be an obstacle to the conversion experience or
at the inception of churches. “Once people grow in faith
they will gradually accept others as equals and as brothers
and sisters,” say those who defend the establishment of
unicultural churches.

We ask, however, does not the reality of churches
around us point to the opposite? Is it not true that many
churches gradually develop into clubs for religious folk¬
lore, becoming increasingly introverted, xenophobic, and
victims of ethnic, class, or culture captivity? We note sadly
that, more often than not, large churches with successful
church growth programs have not made a difference in
the social, racial, and cultural attitudes of their communi¬
ties. My South African experience reminds me that where
segregation is most deeply entrenched, many white seg¬
regationists are born-again Christians whose parents and
grandparents were also born-again Christians. Their com¬
mitment to segregation is not a matter of not having gotten
round to perfection; it is rather the alliance between a
formal Christian commitment and a lifestyle which denies
the gospel itself or subsumes it under a particular racist
ideology.

In the absence of specific teaching at the very outset of
a church’s establishment on the true universal, multi¬
cultural, multiethnic nature of the church, the impression
is conveyed that the particular local church being planted
is limited to people of one defined ethnic group. However
much we may protest, communication theorists assert that
communication is not what you say but what they hear. It
is therefore important to take cognizance that what they
hear is that the church and racial segregation are not
antithetical. We are reminded statistically that Sunday
morning remains the most segregated segment of the week
in the United States. Against this we must assert that it is
wrong to define the church exclusively in ethnic terms. A
church whose membership is coextensive with only one
sociocultural group is not a church in any biblical sense.

Incidentals or essentials

A further important consideration is the question of
whether reconciliation is an incidental or essential part of
the gospel. If it is incidental, there is no reason not to
postpone this teaching in the life of the new convert or
new church. The Scriptures, however, make it plain that
reconciliation is at the very heart of the gospel (2 Cor.
5:18-20). Reconciliation with God, always assumed and
declared to be coextensive with reconciliation to one’s
fellow humanity, is inextricably at the very core of the
gospel message. Paul speaks of Christ’s salvific act at the
cross breaking down every barrier and so inaugurating “a
new creation,” a new humanity (Eph. 2:11-22). This new
humanity is made up of people of many socioethnic
backgrounds who have become reconciled to God and to
each other. It is imperative that prospective Christians be
counseled regarding the kind of community of which they
become a part when they accept Christ’s lordship over all
of their lives.

Identity and the believers church

Closely parallel to the foregoing is the ramification of the
believers church concept espoused by the Anabaptists.
This particular concept promotes the understanding that
the Christian’s primary identity is not as a member of a
particular national, cultural, or ethnic entity, but as a child
of God. A person’s ethnic or family ties become secondary
to the new familial relationships with Christian brothers

and sisters from many tribes and tongues and peoples and
nations, who together become a part of the family of God
through the common act of faith in Christ (Rev. 7:9). The
church, a gathering of the family of God’s people, ought
to witness to the fact that all other associations—racial,
national, or cultural—are of secondary significance.

Peace and nonconformity

The Anabaptist commitment to the peace witness when
adequately enunciated is not merely the quest for the
cessation of hostility and conflict. It requires a commit¬
ment to building harmonious, healthy, reconciled commu¬
nities. The church, in its witness to peace in a world torn
apart by many racial hostilities, ethnic conflicts, and
cultural divisions, must point to the reconciliation and
harmonious coexistence of these different groups within
church life. Without the integrity of its own life-witness,
the church cannot witness for peace in the world. Besides,
our Anabaptist heritage challenges us to nonconformity in
the interest of preserving our loyalty to scriptural injunc¬
tions. Ethnic churches are often the consequence of
succumbing to the “way of the world,’’ of conforming to
patterns in unredeemed society.

At a time when many despair of the church’s cultural
captivity and are looking anew at the Anabaptist ecclesi-
ologica! model (Hauerwas and Willimon 1990), we must
be vigilant that our eagerness to meet goals does not
deceive us into surrendering our biblical distinctiveness.
It is not the largess of our enterprise that will impress the
world or win us God’s approbation (cf. Rev. 2:8-11), but
the witness of a church that reflects the triumph of God’s
grace and love in “making all things new.’’

References Cited

Arias, Mortimer

1984 Announcing the Reign of God: Evangelism and the Subversive

Memory of Jesus. Philadelphia: Fortress Press.

Castro, Emilio

1985 Sent Free: Mission and Unity in the Perspective of the Kingdom.

Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans.

Chilton, Bruce and J. I. H. McDonald

1988 Jesus and the Ethics of the Kingdom. Grand Rapids: Wm. B.

Eerdmans.

Hauerwas, Stanley and William Willimon
1990 “Peculiar People.” Christianity Today (March 5) 16-19.

1989 Resident Aliens. Nashville: Abingdon Press.

The church's witness

How My Understanding of Mission Has Developed

MILKA RINDZINSKI

I became a Mennonite Church member in 1956 in
response to testimonies of the first missionaries who came
to Uruguay. At that time I understood the mission of the
church to be calling others to find what I had found—the
way to a new life of personal holiness.

The gospel came to me in ethnic and cultural wrappings,
including European and North American traditions. It was
also filtered through a system of historic interpretation.
Coming from a Roman Catholic tradition which I was now
laying aside, it was important for me to discover and affirm
my new identity. I took on the Mennonite Christian
identity with enthusiasm because, by reading available
Anabaptist literature, I discovered similarities between the
priest Menno Simon’s concerns and my own. Shortly
thereafter when, because of my physical appearance, I
was identified in Uruguayan Evangelical circles as a
Mennonite, I thought it was amusing. I even saw it as a
confirmation that I had adopted the right church. Later
when I traveled in Central American countries I was not
so happy when my physical appearance caused me to be

Milka Rindzinski is director of the Study Center for the Mennonite
Church located in Montevideo, Uruguay. Her thirty years of
Mennonite involvement includes writing and editing curriculum
material and leadership roles in her local congregation as well as
national. Southern Cone, and Latin-American Mennonite Church
activities.

called Yankee and gringa.

The Mennonite Evangelical Seminary in Montevideo
was inaugurated the same year I was baptized. Through
the seminary I came into contact with the systematic study
of the Bible and theology and discovered its importance.
By helping the seminary director with correspondence
related to his counseling role with other church workers
in South American countries, I became conscious of the
wider Mennonite community. As I shed some of my
unrealistic notions of the simplicity of the Christian life, I
came to feel part of this global church community. In
difficult moments I am grateful to belong to this larger
family and to know that I am not alone. Books and
magazines help me understand the concerns and visions
of other brothers and sisters, many whom I now know
personally. These persons contributed to my development
and helped me mature in my convictions.

I was challenged by local relatives and friends who were
not part of the church and did not find meaning in a gospel
“imported’’ by the Mennonites. Even the harshest criti¬
cism and the greatest indifference has been useful to
reaffirm and revise convictions, and to point out the
imperative of finding a way to embody the gospel in this
local reality.

A third area of challenge has been interdenominational
relationships. Each denomination has its own vision and
emphases, some of which coincide with ours and some
which do not. Sometimes the interdenominational activi-

25

ties have served to channel personal concerns. Not being
able to count on total support from our Mennonite group
has caused some sadness and frustration for me at times;
other times it has caused me to question. Gathering the
most biblically radical emphases in church missions into
a single denomination has been a recurrent dream.

When I went to Mennonite World Conference in
Strasbourg, France, in 1984 to participate in the Consul¬
tation on Missions, I thought we would observe and
evaluate the styles and policies of the mission boards,
because when we speak of missions we think first of
mission boards and the missionaries who have come from
other lands. In general, the mission of missionaries was
always to win souls for Christ, and the churches that were
formed interpreted their continued task and mission to be
that of inviting persons around them to be converted and
saved. I would like to have talked about missionary policies
in Strasbourg. Nevertheless, our task at the Consultation
on Missions was to interpret our reason for being, vocation,
and the lifestyle of the church—in other words, our own
local group.

I would say that the preoccupation to discover other
responsibilities for the church apart from winning souls
has entered our midst very gradually and is still not very
pronounced today since there is no unified model.

As I understand it, the church today (the men and
women who have accepted the call of God with Christ,
the head) is the supreme channel by which God has
chosen to reveal himself. First, I see the church function¬
ing as the conscience of humanity, a sensitive nerve and
spiritual eye, a bridge between humanity and a holy and
just God. Second, I see the church embodying the good
news of Jesus Christ in a visible way to the world, taking
on an alternate lifestyle, such as community living, which
will necessarily go against the tide. Thirdly, the church’s
task is determined by multiple and changing human
needs. In this sense the church should discover that there
are no areas of human life that escape the interest and
activity of God. We can see this in Jesus, who ministered
to human needs at spiritual and personal levels, and who
realized how the social and power structures affected the
men and women of his era.

To accomplish their mission the churches must be
capable of discerning what the major problems are today
and occupy themselves with these problems without fear
of going beyond the limits of their responsibility. Here are
some examples:

1. One of the tasks for the Mennonite Church in La
Floresta could be to raise its voice against the carbide
factory across the street, with its two tall chimneys and
huge foundries contaminating the air of a densely popu¬
lated area of the capital.

2. The poor and impoverished people of areas which
surround the church knock at our doors. They come with
their carts and look through our garbage cans for anything
useful. We put our old bread in plastic bags so it won’t get
dirty and they can eat it. They try to sell us small objects,
and we buy them. They ask for food and clothing, and
sometimes we give it to them. They steal the wash off our
clotheslines, and we report it to the police, hoping to
recover it. We build high fences, hoping they will be
discouraged and not enter again. And we hardly speak
with them. We are not interested in knowing about their
situation, what they think or feel. We don’t pay any more
attention to them than to birds.

3. Those who suffer because of injustice demand our

26

compassion and attention. But there are a series of words
with negative connotations at which we cringe: justice,
oppression, liberation, poverty. These terms and their
meanings should be carefully examined with the Bible in
hand because there is a tendency to spiritualize them.
There is also a tendency to look at those who suffer and
then decide who deserves our active compassion and who
doesn’t. Allegedly the church is forbidden to enter polit¬
ical territory, but I suspect in many cases it is simply fear
of suffering that makes us “spiritual’’ to the point that we
avoid political issues which could be dangerous to our
physical integrity.

During times of military government in my country I
was part of an interdenominational group that dealt with
matters of mutual interest to the churches we represented.
We discussed a project to create a psychological/spiritual
service for the children of prisoners. Many children saw
their parents snatched out of their homes never to return.
Surely these children needed attention. The project was
rejected by the government, and we did not dare to insist.
Why do we renounce a service project so quickly when
the government opposes it? To what point do we owe
them obedience? This question needs to be examined.

4. In general, our churches don’t express themselves on
questions of political nature. I’m not saying that the church
is called to govern politically nor that there can be a truly
just government. But I do observe that justice-making is
left to personal judgment and, as a result, church members
look for orientation and channels of expression outside
the church. Uruguay is a highly political country; we are
legally obligated to vote, so it is impossible not to think,
hold opinions, or have some political concerns.

Even those who maintain that politics are forbidden
territory for the church have and express opinions. As a
newspaper reporter said recently, they applaud when they
hear on television that an evangelist from the Northern
Hemisphere calls some governments in Central America
“Satan” and thanks the president of the United States for
helping the nation recover the faith.

It is lamentable that churches in general don’t warn that,
even if communism is atheistic, other systems can also lead
to idolatry.

5. This same prejudice that church and politics must
remain separate is the reason prophetic activity in the
church is vague (“great things will happen”). I believe it
is necessary to talk seriously about the topic in order to
distinguish between “doing politics” and fulfilling our call
to denounce injustice.

Of course, if the church makes its prophetic voice heard
it will attract suffering to itself. Recently, meetings were
held in Argentina where high-level military commanders
from Latin America discussed how to confront liberation
theology, among other things. It is considered revolution¬
ary because, with its consciousness-raising work of choos¬
ing for the poor and by its demands for justice, it threatens
the stability of those in power.

On the other hand, this danger of suffering makes many
churches—in their zeal to make it clear they have no ties
with liberation theology—spiritualize the concepts of
peace, justice, liberation, and oppression.

Mennonite churches need to discover that they are heirs
of a theological line that constitutes a third option.

6. The churches should be more sagacious in identifying
the idols that claim our loyalty so that we understand our
rejection of any lordship outside of the lordship of Jesus
Christ. I remember once, when I was new in the evangel-

ical Mennonite faith and very patriotic, that I stood up
when I heard the national anthem. The pastor looked at
me with a condescending smile that intrigued me. I did
not ask for explanations and none were given. It would
have been a good opportunity to talk about the lordship
of Jesus Christ. Many years later I discovered that the
content of the anthem and the concept of patriotism
contained demands that clashed with the demands of
Jesus Christ. And patriotism is only one of the many idols
which exist.

7. Churches should clarify what sin is today. It is
necessary to read the Bible from a present-day viewpoint
and, departing from biblical examples, help one another
discern what is morally good or bad in our complicated
world. It could be that we are laying aside sins that are
disguised but are far-reaching and have great disintegrat¬
ing power. I continue to believe that as followers of Christ
we are called to a life of holiness and purity where there
is no place for a double morality.

8. In light of the diversity of emphases among the various
churches and denominations, one of the greatest chal¬
lenges is the search for unity. For some reason we are
inclined to compartmentalize ourselves. When we acquire
a vision, we tend to concentrate on and emphasize it,
even losing interest in all other emphases. This attitude
denotes a mental and spiritual narrowness that must be
corrected. We could ask ourselves if the emphases answer

to different callings. Our challenge is to find ways to
integrate various efforts so that the ministry of the com¬
bined churches can minister to the total person in all areas
of life.

I believe the church needs to discover that the Lord s
calling to unity is not a calling to be identical in every¬
thing—in style of praise or understanding of how we serve
our neighbor—but to love and respect each other, with
mutual correction and help.

9. The Mennonite churches should deepen their radical
and pacifistic Anabaptist tradition. Mennonite church
members in Uruguay are mainly first-generation Chris¬
tians from Roman Catholic and Pentecostal backgrounds.
So the mission task of the church often marks the more
active interdenominational or inter-American movements.
And generally, the one that is most appealing is the one
that is the most spiritual.

Unless the Mennonite churches discover and are faith¬
ful to the task that the Lord entrusts to them by sharing
the vision they have inherited with the community of faith,
the name “Mennonite” and being a Mennonite confer¬
ence does not have true meaning.

In some cases, tradition can be a hindrance. In other
cases, clarifying our identity offers support and can mark
a course. In the end, following a tradition can mean
making good use of a heritage of wisdom.

In Review

Glimpses of Glory. By Dave and Neta
Jackson. Elgin, IL: Brethren Press, 1987;
324 pp., $14.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Ed Bontrager

For others like me who knew about Reba
Place Fellowship but never understood its
unique community of ministry, this book
will be helpful. Dave and Neta Jackson are
members of the Fellowship since 1973.
Their easy style of reporting events sea¬
soned with illustrations provides an intri¬
guing account.

The authors highlight four eras: Radical
Launching (1951-61); Consolidation Out¬
reach (1962-71); The Spirit, the Power,
and the Excess (1972-78); Repentance,
Regrouping, and Renewal (1979-87). The
vicissitudes of corporate life as the com¬
munity struggled through these eras un¬
cover some darker travailing times, yet the
message is clear that God builds his people

CORRECTION

In the March 1990 issue of Mission
Focus , the editors omitted an intro¬
duction of Linford Stutzman, author
of the article An Incamational Ap¬
proach to Mission in Modem Affluent
Societies. Working with Eastern Men¬
nonite Board of Missions, Linford and
his wife, Janet, have given leadership
to the Perth Mennonite Fellowship in
Lathlain, Australia since 1987.

as they take each other seriously.

Reba Place was formed as a setting
where ideas of the church (Acts 4) and the
sixteenth-century Anabaptist movement
could combine to find fulfillment in the
twentieth century. The “common life’’ was
the ideal. The community became a light¬
house for shipwrecked people, providing
healing, counseling, friendship, and the
message of spiritual grace. Inclusiveness
and involvement in a large, loving family
provided an anchor, also seen in their
worship style which included drama,
dance, and a more charismatic expression.

In the early ’80s it was decided to form
two expressions of the community, one for
those who wanted to maintain the “com¬
mon life,” and one as a congregational
expression without the “common life.” And
the congregation grew.

This history portrays the joining of word
and deed, evangelism and social service—a
model that needs to be applied to many
more congregations. This is a helpful re¬
source for churches intent in moving be¬
yond maintenance to mission. Jacksons do
not convey that this vision is easy to realize
but show that intense fellowship and vi¬
sionary leadership can bring effective
kingdom work.

Ed Bontrager, with previous pastoral as¬
signments in Ohio, California, and Pennsyl¬
vania, is currently Director of Evangelism
and Church Development for Mennonite
Board of Missions, Elkhart, Indiana.

The Unseen Face of Islam. By Bill Musk.
Eastbourne, East Sussex, England: Mon¬
arch Publications, 1989; 314 pp., 7.99
pounds sterling

Reviewed by Roelf Kuitse

Dr. Bill Musk has worked with Middle East
Media and with the Episcopal Church in
Egypt. His book deals with what has been
called “folk Islam,” the Islam experienced
and expressed by people in villages and
cities who struggle daily with forces that
try to harm human life. In this vulnerable
life, “baraka,” “the evil eye,” “jinn,” and
“saints” play an important role. The author
helps readers to understand this “unusual
kind of Islam,” which in general does not
get much attention in books about Islam.
Attention is paid to holy times and holy
places, holy things and holy persons, holy
powerful words, and holy actions. All these
phenomena are manifestations of a special
worldview. This worldview is described in
the second part of the book. In many cases
this view of reality is in conflict with the
view of official Islam, but, according to Dr.
Musk, this view is “accepted and even
nurtured within the embrace of the alter¬
native, official worldview” (p. 225).

The book also deals with biblical views
of reality and with the ways missionaries
can respond to the challenges of folk Islam
and the longings and fears which find
expression in folk Islam.

This is an excellent book, one which
helps us in understanding the role of Islam

27

in the lives of many people. The book
should be read by all who have established
relations with the Muslim neighbor.

Roelf Kuitse has been a professor of mis¬
sions and world religions at Associated
Mennonite Biblical Seminary, Elkhart, In¬
diana.

New Testament Ethics. By Dale Gold¬
smith. Elgin, IL: Brethren Press, 1988, 185
pp., $9.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Elmer A. Martens

A book that surveys eight New Testament
writers in as many chapters and begins
with James, Paul, and Peter would seem to
be omitting Jesus. Not so! Each writer,
including Matthew, Mark, Luke and John,
is interrogated as to his understanding of
Jesus. Convictions inform ethics.

Pauline material is focused on con¬
science, which functions primarily as an
“after-the-act analyzer.” Not rules, but
needs of others, govern ethics.

Goldsmith is shy on specifics, for he
contends that ethics is more a matter of
character than lists of dos and don’ts.
Given new situations and the fact that
ethical directives cannot emcompass all
situations anyway, the author urges that
Christian ethics is essentially the ethics of
love to others. This is the one ethical
directive that all New Testament writers
share.

The book’s strength is citing the “angle
of vision” governing each New Testament
writer’s ethical statement, the repeated
emphasis on love as expressing the will of
God ethically, and helpful insights, such as
Matthew’s call to be creative. End-of-chap-
ter questions for reflection facilitate use of
the book for Bible classes.

The author fears legalism. Sadly, rather
than to present an adequate theology of
law, legal-type material is disparaged.
Somewhat worrisome is the notion that we
need to dialogue with the New Testament
but that our answers lie outside it. More is
needed on how love is to be specifically
fleshed out. Goldsmith, an ordained
Princeton-educated Presbyterian minister
and now administrator/teacher at McPher¬
son College, has nevertheless provided a
solid popularly-written contribution to the
growing literature on biblical ethics.

Elmer A. Martens, formerly President of
Mennonite Brethren Biblical Seminary in
Fresno, California, continues as Professor of
Old Testament.

28

What Makes a Missionary . By David M.
Howard. Chicago, IL: Moody Press, 1987,
96 pp., $5.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Wanda Derksen-Bergen

Howard has addressed an important topic
which could lend itself to elaborate theo¬
ries and intellectual theology, but instead
he has chosen to bring his thoughts down
to earth in a simple, straight-forward man¬
ner.

Howard follows the life of Peter and how
Jesus prepares Peter step-by-step for ser¬
vice. He begins with Jesus calling Peter,
followed by the growth of Peter and even
the failures of Peter as a missionary. We
then continue to read how Jesus restored
Peter and gave him triumph as a person
called to be a missionary to the Gentiles.
Jesus challenges Peter to serve with humil¬
ity, love, and compassion for all persons.
Howard includes accounts of personal ex¬
periences along with the study of Peter
and challenges readers to examine
whether they, too, have the spirit and
character to serve with the humility, love,
and compassion exemplified by Jesus.

My main disappointment in this book is
that it lacks any tone of radical discipleship
or fresh ideas. Although we need to be
reminded of the basics of missionary ser¬
vice, I miss the challenge of being on the
cutting edge, forced to explore new ave¬
nues of what it takes to be a missionary.
However, the simplicity of the book opens
it up to a wide audience of people.

Wanda Derksen-Bergen is Co-Personnel
Secretary for the Commission on Overseas
Mission of the General Conference Menno¬
nite Church in Newton, Kansas.

Teaching to Change Lives. By Howard G.
Hendricks. Portland, OR: Multnomah
Press, 1987, 180 pp., $9.95, $7.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Daniel Schipani

In this how-to book, Howard G. Hendricks,
well-known author and lecturer in evan¬
gelical circles, articulates what he calls the
“passion to communicate” the Word of
God in terms of seven principles or “laws.”
He does that by utilizing the word teacher
as an acronym—t-e-a-c-h-e-r. The book
thus consists of seven chapters, each one
dealing with a major principle: 1) The law
of the teacher— ongoing personal growth

is essential for teaching; 2) the law of
education —how people learn determines
how you teach; 3) the law of activity —max¬
imum learning is the result of maximum
involvement in meaningful activity; 4) the
law of communication —to truly impart in¬
formation requires the building of bridges;
5) the law of the heart —teaching that
impacts is not head to head, but heart to
heart; 6) the law of encouragement —teach¬
ing tends to be most effective when the
learner is properly motivated; 7) the law
of readiness —the teaching-learning pro¬
cess will be most effective when both
students and teacher are adequately pre¬
pared.

Easy to read, with many anecdotes, prac¬
tical pointers, and suggestions for further
exploration, this book can be a nice gift to
teachers in Sunday school as well as other
settings. It can be used for teacher training
provided that biblico-theological and edu¬
cational foundations are properly dealt
with elsewhere.

Daniel Schipani is Professor of Christian
Education and Personality at Associated
Mennonite Biblical Seminaries, Elkhart, In¬
diana.

Ministry of Missions to African Indepen¬
dent Churches. Edited by David A. Shank.
Elkhart, IN: Mennonite Board of Missions,
1987 (reprinted 1989), 291 pp., $21.50
(pb) plus postage

Reviewed by Hans Kasdorf

David Shank has been engaged in a variety
of ministries among the African Indepen¬
dent Churches (AICs) in French West
Africa since 1976.

In July 1986 the Mennonite Board of
Missions sponsored a Conference on Min¬
istry to the AICs held at Abidjan, Cote
d’Ivoire. Shank was the prime architect
behind this venture. His objective was
twofold: a) to bring together AIC leaders
from various groups who would not other¬
wise meet each other to discuss differ¬
ences as well as similarities and common
goals; b) to assist Western Christians in
getting a better understanding of the way
the Lord is building his church in Africa.
The book is evidence that Shank suc¬
ceeded remarkably well with the first ob¬
jective; the second depends on the number
and type of people reading the book.

The book consists of papers read at the
conference by a team of resource persons
from Africa, America, and Europe who
know from personal experience and scien¬
tific studies both history and makeup of the
AICs. Introductory materials, 14 chapters,
and several appendices offer at least 18
windows through which anglophone read¬
ers around the world can take an objective
look at the AIC origins and developments,
structures and relationships, worldviews
and struggles, concerns and aspirations.

This phenomenal movement of our time
has some 30 million followers involving
about 8,000 African denominations. The
names alone are intriguing: Power in
Christ Church; Church of Abraham; Tovi-
ator Healing Church; Almighty Jehovah
Jesus Christ Church; Christ Action
Church; and God Have Mercy Church (cf.
pp. 59-86).

Missiologists, mission leaders, church
historians, and pastors who want to know
what God is doing in Africa should read
this book.

Hans Kasdorf is Professor of World Mission
and department chair at Mennonite
Brethren Biblical Seminary, Fresno, Cali¬
fornia.

Witness: Empowering the Church. By A.
Grace Wenger and Dave and Neta Jack-
son. Scottdale, PA: Herald Press, 1989,196
pp., $8.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Arnie Neufeld

The authors of this book believe that the
primary and urgent task of the church is
to “go and make disciples of all nations.”
They maintain that telling “others about
Christ is not an option like dessert after a
full meal. It is part of the nature of being
Christian.... Winning others to Christ is not
one of the many duties of the church...
Winning others to Christ is the church’s
reason for existence” (p. 28).

The book contends that the mission of
the church has not been placed into the
hands of a select few, nor is it the respon¬
sibility of leaders. Rather, all members of
the body of Christ should contribute to and
participate in this important venture.

In order to be effective in outreach,
Christians must be renewed in worship,
directed by the Holy Spirit, and encour¬
aged and supported through the fellowship

of the church. However, worship and fel¬
lowship are not only the blessing of those
who have become members of the “believ¬
ing family”; they are “part of the content
of the Christian message” (p. 124). Recog¬
nizing the value of care groups, the authors
provide helpful suggestions on how to
organize, strengthen, and enlarge such fel¬
lowship groups in the church. They pro¬
vide many Scripture references,
illustrations, and stories, and leave the
reader with the message: “We did it; you
can, too.”

Each of the 13 chapters concludes with
a series of discussion questions. The book
could be used as an effective guide in a
church study group, or serve as a text in a
more formal classroom situation. It is prac¬
tical, biblical, and inspirational. We recom¬
mend it highly.

Arnie Neufeld, Winkler, Manitoba, is pastor
of the Bergthaler Mennonite Church.

Mennonites in China. By Robert and Alice
Ruth Ramseyer. Winnipeg, MB: China Ed¬
ucational Exchange, 1988 (revised 1989),
115 pp., $5.00 U.S., $6.00 Canada (pb)

Reviewed by Hugh Sprunger

It is appropriate and commendable that
the China Educational Exchange, a coop¬
erative effort of different Mennonite
church groups relating to China, commis¬
sioned the writing and publishing of this
book. It meets a long-felt need on the part
of many Mennonite China-watchers and
participants in work in China and among
Chinese people. Different Mennonite
groups worked in China in the first half of
the twentieth century. They essentially
worked independently and each group
published its own accounts of its work in
China, the churches, leaders, and mission¬
aries. The story of Mennonites in China
was fragmented. It was difficult to get an
overall picture.

The Ramseyers, in brief compass, give
the big picture of Mennonites in China
from 1895 up to about 1951, with some
glimpses about churches and leaders in the
years since that time. The Mennonite story
is preceded with a short summary of Chris¬
tian mission in China in chapter one. Chro¬
nologically and geographically, the
Mennonite story then unfolds from 1901
on Shandong-Henan border to Fujian,
Inner Mongolia, and West China. It is a

fascinating story. The historical sweep
ends with an afterword. This chapter gives
credit to many Mennonite efforts for a
holistic gospel emphasis but faults Men¬
nonites, like many others, for failing to
emphasize mutuality in sharing. This brief
summary is most helpful and raises ques¬
tions for present and future relationships
with Chinese people and Christians.

The book is not intended to be a defin¬
itive history of Mennonite missions in
China or the story of missionaries. How¬
ever, a list of Mennonite missionaries is
appended. The focus is on the churches
and leaders which emerged in China as a
result of Mennonite work there. This em¬
phasis is noteworthy.

This is an important book for all persons
interested in missions and overseas
churches. Mennonites from all different
backgrounds and groups should read it to
be aware of what sister Mennonites did in
China. Not only North American ethnic
Mennonites need to read this book but also
Chinese Mennonites in North America,
Taiwan, Hong Kong, and China in order to
be aware of the larger family of which they
are a part.

Hugh Sprunger is a Mennonite missionary,
first working in Taiwan with the Commis¬
sion on Overseas Mission of the General
Conference Mennonite Church from 1954-
1979, and now working with Eastern Men¬
nonite Board of Missions in Hong Kong
from 1980 to the present.

Gospel, Church, and Kingdom. By James
A. Scherer. Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg
Publishing House, 1987, 271 pp., $14.95
(pb)

Reviewed by Calvin E. Shenk

The author intends that this book “provide
students and teachers of world missions—
along with missionaries, pastors, mission
executives, lay mission interpreters, and
church leaders generally—with resource
material for the study of recent develop¬
ments in the theology of mission” (p. 5).
It is a synoptic and comparative view of
recent mission theology from an ecumen¬
ical perspective with the intent of promot¬
ing conversation and understanding
among Christians of differing traditions
concerning faithfulness to the great com¬
mission.

This is an excellent book. It is thorough

29

in drawing material from a wide variety of
missiological conferences, consultations,
councils, and seminars. It combines his¬
tory and theology in a way that highlights
the trends of development. The author is
fair in representing the traditions. His
interpretive remarks are concise, but they
appropriately identify issues for thought
and conversation. Though admitting that
the missionary movement in the West is in
crisis, the author is not pessimistic but
neither does he want us to nostalgically
return to the past. Rather, this should be
a call to realistic vision for the present and
future.

Interpretation and critique are major
strengths of this book. There is formal
critique at the end of the chapters on the
evangelical movement and the Roman
Catholic tradition. Unfortunately, there is
not a similar kind of summary and critique
at the end of the chapters on the conciliar
movement. This could have strengthened
even more the comparative dimensions.

I especially value the introductory chap¬
ter characterizing the new context for
global mission and the last chapter which
identifies crucial issues for mission theol¬
ogy. I commend the author for his insis¬
tence on theological clarification. As an
Anabaptist, I also found his chapter on the
history of Lutheran theology of mission to
be very helpful. He has stimulated me to
look again at the theology of mission in the
early stages of the Reformation.

I applaud the author for his very stimu¬
lating work and highly recommend a care¬
ful reading of this book. It forces one to
examine more deliberately the relationship
of mission practice to clear theological
reflection.

Calvin E. Shenk is chair of the Bible and
Religion Department of Eastern Mennonite
College.

Power and Beliefs in South Africa. By
Klaus Nurnberger. Pretoria, South Africa:
University of South Africa, 1988, 319 pp.,
18 pounds sterling

Reviewed by Stan Nussbaum

When Nurnberger introduces his work as
a study of “the interaction between eco¬
nomic power structures and patterns of
conviction seen in the light of a Christian
ethic” (p.l), the casual reader may suppose
he or she has heard it all before. This is not

a book for casual readers.

The perceptive reader will soon find that
Nurnberger attempts and largely succeeds
to posit an innovative paradigm bringing
together “hard” or statistical data dealing
with economics and power and “soft” in¬
tangible data dealing with convictions. This
experimental method does incredible
things, such as relating in one diagram (p.
85) a quantified total of a person’s eco¬
nomic needs (based on physical essentials,
social group expectations and personal
wishes) with the person’s income position
at the economic center or periphery of a
society. Looking at this I felt I was concep¬
tually “seeing” for the first time what pov¬
erty is.

The experience of “seeing” is the one I
had repeatedly as I read this book. Some¬
times this had to do with applications
Nurnberger made—why Bantus tans will
never work economically (p. 23), why local
elites in the third world are unconcerned
about the poor in their countries (p. 68),
why the poor buy radios they cannot afford
(p. 1021), why corruption is rampant in
postindependent Africa (p. 161), and, not
least, why a feudal pattern carried over into
a modern competitive setting produces
oppression, i.e., why apartheid is what it is
(p. 173f). At other times Nurnberger’s
discussion gave me a new perspective on
some old problems and issues in my own
experience—a realization of the crucial
difference between “available” and
“operative” information (p. 139) in missiol-
ogy and mission administration; a revela¬
tion about why my work and personal
schedules are so full (p. 273, “The rich are
plagued by an overabundance of
potency ”); how the Fall has affected all
aspects of individual and corporate life (p.
283, cf. p. 139); why the justification of war
seems plausible, though it is false (p. 145).

Charts and diagrams are extremely valu¬
able throughout the book (e.g., pp. 47, 65,
85), but a few improvements are still pos¬
sible in this area. Why is figure 12 men¬
tioned on page 51, given in statistics on
page 52, and graphed on page 59? Why is
no diagram given correlating the material
on evangelism and social justice on pages
270-86 analogous to the diagram on page
139? (This could have been a powerful
summary of the book’s implications.) Why
is no explicit connection made between
the two major diagrams in the book, pages
139 and 283, since they obviously relate to
each other?

Some theological questions also must be
raised. We need to know more about
Nurnberger’s rejection of virtually all dog¬
matic criteria for church fellowship except

“Christ’s redemptive love” (p. 295). Has he
overreacted to apartheid’s exclusiveness
and produced too inclusive a view of the
church? Again, is he too optimistic about
the church providing a model which sec¬
ular society will see and follow (p. 298)?

These questions do not detract from the
book’s central thrust, which perhaps could
be summed up as the interaction between
vested interests and worldview. Where
else do we find the same writer dealing so
well with both these issues in one model
from the perspective of Christian ethics?
There is much to learn here, and not only
about South Africa. This is a book about
what makes the world go around and what
makes it go around painfully.

Stan Nussbaum is director of the Centre for
New Religious Movements at Selly Oak
Colleges in Birmingham, England. From
1977 through 1983 he worked in Lesotho
under Africa Inter-Mennonite Mission.

Aspiring to Freedom. Edited by Kenneth
A. Myers. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans,
1988, 169 pp., $10.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Roelf Kuitse

“The social concerns of the Church”
(,Sollicitudo Rei Socialis) is the subject of a
papal encyclical written by Pope John Paul
II and published in 1988. In this encyclical
letter the present pope expresses his
views—like his predecessor Paul VI did in
1967 in his encyclical Populorum Pro-
gressio —in regard to today’s social issues.
The main attention is focused on the issue
of development, the relation between poor
and rich nations. Related to this, the papal
letter deals with issues like the arms trade,
the debt problem, refugees, terrorism,
ecology, demography, human rights, un¬
employment. The pope rejects a concept
of development reduced to the economic
component. Ethical as well as religious
components are also important. He criti¬
cizes the liberal-capitalistic and the Marx¬
ist-communistic ideologies, the first
because it absolutizes “the all-consuming
desire for profit,” the second because it
absolutizes the “thirst for power” (p. 37).
Both ideologies are a hindrance to a real
and full development and interdepen¬
dence.

Commentaries on this encyclical are
written by authors related to the Rockford

30

Institute Center on Religion and Society.
All the commentators express their satis¬
faction with the encyclical’s emphasis on
“the right of economic initiative” and “the
creative subjectivity of the citizen.” They
strongly criticize “the moral parallelism”
(Michael Novak) between the two blocs,
capitalism and communism. This moral
equivalence is in contradiction with what
the pope writes about human rights, the
right of economic initiative, and the ethi¬
cal/religious components of development.
Peter Berger speaks about the language of
the papal letter as the language of ter-
cermundismo (third-worldism), a language
used by “the peace and justice crowd who
have a high stake in speaking of East and
West in morally equivalent terms.” His
grade for the encyclical is between a B-
and a C+.

Roelf S. Kuitse has been Professor of Mis¬
sions and World Religions at Associated
Mennonite Biblical Seminaries, Elkhart, In¬
diana.

The Church and Cultures: New Perspec¬
tives in Missiological Anthropology. By
Louis J. Luzbetak. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis
Books, 1988, 464 pp., $19.95.

Reviewed by Levi Keidel

Serving in the Pontifical Council for Cul¬
ture, Vatican City, Luzbetak authored The
Church and Cultures: An Applied Anthro¬
pology for the Religious Worker in 1963. It
became an undisputed classic in the field.
This new edition is an updated and ex¬
panded form of his previous work, provid¬
ing what appears to be his definitive
statement. His earlier work was directed
toward the western church worker who
sought to effect cultural change from with¬
out. In keeping with the current trend
away from foreign missions to global mis¬
sions, this volume is addressed to ecclesial
workers in local church communities who
effect change from within.

The thesis of the book is that anthropo¬
logical insights can and should improve
mission strategy and effectiveness. It is the
author’s concern that such insights facili¬
tate a form of contextualization that makes
Jesus relevant.

Luzbetak’s treatment is thorough, histor¬
ical, and documented. Often he furnishes
a paragraph of bibliographic resources to
facilitate thematic research. His style is
simple and straightforward; the nature and
scope of his subject precludes the written
text which is quickly and easily grasped.

Chapter one gives theological founda¬

tions for the subject, chapter two defines
the nature and scope of missiological an¬
thropology, and chapter three provides
theoretical and historical models of mis¬
sion. It closes on a prophetic note—that
we are moving away from the vision of
global Christendom toward a situation
where Christians will form a minority, and
that the task of the church will be making
Christ globally accessible. In chapter four,
the author develops issues that impact
mission, including the effects of Vatican II
upon Roman Catholic theology of mission.

Then follows a scrupulous study (241
pages) of the phenomenon of culture.
“Cultures are like a ball of tangled strings
... one must study the particular tangled
whole and see which string must be tack¬
led first, which knot must be untied now
and which later” (p. 244). Luzbetak exam¬
ines anthropological developments: how
culture is perceived, understood as a sys¬
tem, the nature of its dynamics, the factors
which facilitate or resist its change. A final
chapter attempts to synthesize anthropo¬
logical theory of the preceding chapters
into functioning models for the church.

This volume is not everybody’s cup of
tea; but for persons whose responsibility it
is to be on the cutting edge of mission
strategy, it provides a wealth of essential
scientific knowledge.

Levi Keidel is currently Instructor of Mis¬
sion at Columbia Bible College, Clearbrook,
British Columbia.

31

Editorial

One of the themes dominating the agenda of the churches
in the West today is pluralism. Whether it is theology,
culture, or religion, we find ourselves living in a time of
great mobility. I continue to be fascinated by the traffic
that passes through the world’s airports. These are the
main concourses where peoples of the most diverse social,
national, and economic backgrounds come together. It is
not uncommon to see people from rural villages of Africa
or Asia, still feeling awkward and unfamiliar with technol¬
ogy, in the airports of the world’s major capitals. This is a
metaphor for what is happening worldwide. We cannot
escape the effects of this rapid multiform movement. How
are we as Christians responding to this changing situation?

1. Religions variety. Birmingham, England, is represen¬
tative of many major cities of the West where there has
been a steady growth in the number of people of Asian
and African background over the past twenty years—
today 15 percent of Birmingham’s population would be in
this category. The Central Mosque in Birmingham is the
largest mosque west of Istanbul, but it is only one of fifty
in the city. The majority of these people live in the
crowded central sections of Birmingham. Since they
originated in a variety of countries, they have brought
their ethnic differences with them. Thus they tend to live
as communal groups. The majority of them were villagers
without special skills or education, and they have ended
up on the lower rung of the social and economic ladder.
One reaction of immigrant communities is to intensify
their religious life as they sense the tension between the
new culture and their culture of origin. They are especially
eager to pass on to their children their own faith tradition.
It is a situation filled with tensions and anxieties.

2. Church variety. Church gatherings beyond the con¬
gregational level are increasingly characterized by variety
in piety, styles of worship, and nationality. For some
people this is still a novelty, and the experience of such
diversity is captivating. More important than these diver¬
sities is that which is given to us as the basis for unity. The
whole of the post-Babel human story is dominated by our
dividedness. What is worth celebrating is that we have

been given a chance for a new beginning in the work of
Jesus Christ. Human differences remain, but these are to
be reevaluated in light of the “broken wall.” A more sober
assessment of these differences helps us recognize that
these divisions come about over the simplest matters and
remain a source of sinning against each other.

3. Theological variety. Theological strife and divisions
continue to dog the steps of the church. No theological
idea appears in a vacuum. It is the product of a history
and relationships and tendencies. Free church Protes¬
tants, with their emphasis on individual responsibility,
divide and subdivide with alarming ease. Roman Catholics
are presently debating John Paul II’s call for “A New
Evangelization” because some hear this as an appeal to
restore traditional Christendom. It has created unrest
because the appeal is seen within a particular history.
Theological variety may stem from historical, cultural,
psychological, or other “non-theological” differences.

J. B. Metz has proposed that one way of mediating
between these differences is that of memory. “The
Church, of course, from its beginnings, is a remembering
and retelling community gathered around the eucharist
to devote itself to following Jesus.” Memory is thus
centered on suffering and redemption.

One of the special problems of Western theology is its
dependence on a particular Western intellectual tradition
that emphasizes rationality and system. The act of remem¬
bering and retelling puts the emphasis elsewhere: human
weakness and sin, God’s grace and sovereignty, death and
resurrection, the movement from despair to hope, God’s
coming to us and our response in worship.

As A. F. Walls demonstrates, the Christian message has
shown an amazing vitality in moving across cultural
boundaries over time. This act of translation calls for a
corollary. Translation highlights the power of the gospel
to enter particular situations and there become “good
news.” But the process is not completed until translation
issues in incorporation into the universal fullness of the
new humanity in Christ Jesus.

—Wilbert R. Shenk

POSTMASTER: Send Form 3579 to Box 370, Elkhart, IN 46515-0370
32

September 1990
Volume 18 Number 3

MISSION

FOCUS

The Growth of the Early Church

Reflections on Recent Literature

ALAN KREIDER

Why did the early church grow? For most of this century
the reflexive response of scholars to this has been, “Look
in Harnack.” Adolf von Harnack’s The Mission and Expan¬
sion of Christianity is one of the heavyweight books of
church history; it has filled the footnotes of generations
of scholars. For a long time, as far as these writers were
concerned, it seemed that the topic of the early church’s
mission had been “done.”

No longer. Within the current decade, scholars are
beginning to look anew at the growth of the early—post-
apostolic, pre-Constantinian—church. One of these schol¬
ars, the Roman Catholic Norbert Brox, wrote an important
article, On Christian Mission in Late Antiquity , from a
perspective similar to Harnack—that of church history.
Two others, Ramsay MacMullen and Robin Lane Fox,
have fresh things to say because their books come at the
topic from a different angle. Both are eminent classicists,
bringing the perspectives of ancient history and literature
to bear on the life of the early Christians. MacMullen’s
Christianizing the Roman Empire argues a dubious thesis
with learning and panache; Lane Fox’s Pagan and Chris¬
tian, on the other hand, is a magisterial study.

Brox, Lane Fox, and MacMullen offer insights that
fascinate and invite us to ponder our own time in new
ways. Drawing from all three, and occasionally from other
authorities as well, we can listen critically to this new
generation’s approaches to the growth of the early church.

To begin with, the early church was a growing church.
On this obvious fact, both Lane Fox and MacMullen make
fascinating observations. Lane Fox notes that there are
few statistics, and that these must be interpreted with care.
In Rome in A.D. 251, for example, there were 154
ministers of one sort or another and 1,500 widows and
poor people; ten years earlier, in Dura Europos on the
Euphrates, a wall was knocked down in the house where
the church met, allowing 60 persons rather than 30 to
attend the meetings. From figures like these, Lane Fox
infers a small but growing Christian movement. It was
widely scattered throughout the ancient world, most
densely rooted in the cities, and “very much the

Alan and Eleanor Kreider, overseas workers with Mennonite
Board of Missions, have lived in London, England, since 1974.

exception” in the countryside. Less cautious than Lane
Fox, MacMullen hazards an approximate growth rate for
early Christianity. From the end of the first century, the
Christian church grew by approximately one-half million
members per generation, giving a total of five million
members—8 percent of the imperial population—at the
time of Constantine s conversion in A.D. 312. (Lane Fox’s
estimate is somewhat smaller: 4 to 5 percent.)

Why this growth? It was not, our authorities agree, for
reasons that would seem self-evident to most modern
missiologists. The early church did not have an organized
missionary program. There was no sign, Lane Fox com¬
ments, “of a mission directed by church leaders ... we
cannot name a single active Christian missionary between
St. Paul and the age of Constantine” (Lane Fox 1986:282).
Brox agrees that “there was no organization of mission”
(1982:193). After the first generation, the church’s leaders
were pastoring already existing churches, not founding
new ones or winning new believers; and there were, of
course, no mission boards! The growth of the early church
was not planned; for all of the Christians’ active recruit¬
ment of new believers, it was as if by “accident” (Brox
1982:224).

Was this growth because the early Christians prayed
and theologized about mission? Not so, Brox argues. The
early believers rarely prayed for the conversion of non-
Christians; he cites an article by Yves Congar, who has
found only eight examples of such prayers in the entire
Christian literature of the first three centuries (Brox
1982:211-212). Similarly, the early church did not have a
well-developed missionary theology. “Mission was not a
theme in the surviving early sermons. The concern for
mission, as well as the necessity of the conversion of
non-Christians and the corresponding duty of Christians
to participate in a general missionary duty, was almost
never expressed” (Brox 1982:193-194).

Themes dear to later Christians do not appear in the
writings of the early believers. Jesus’ commission in Mat¬
thew 28:16-20 is never cited as a motive for mission. This
commission, the early Christians contended, had already
been fulfilled; it had been a task limited to the original
apostles, which they had carried out by scattering system¬
atically across the world and founding churches. By doing

33

this, they had asserted Jesus’ lordship over every land and
people; their missionary effort had been the central
episode in “the world-historical drama of the proclamation
of the gospel” (Brox 1982:206). Henceforth there would
be no apostles (Ephesians 4:11 is superseded); instead
there would be pastors and teachers, who would faithfully
carry on the traditions of Christ Jesus as laid down by his
monogenerational apostles.

But growth of new believers and new congregations
would continue. It would take place within the framework
already established by the apostles. Until Christ returned,
however, this growth would never be all-encompassing.
In the meantime, as the church continued to be embattled
in its struggle with the “world,” its members would give
primary attention to their intramural life.

If the primary focus of the pre-Constantinian Christians
was thus directed inward, why the growth of their
churches? Our authorities all agree in rejecting one reason
and affirming another.

The reason they reject is the pattern of public preaching
recorded in the Acts of the Apostles. They would thus give
little credence to Michael Green’s conviction that, despite
the lack of evidence, “there can be no doubt that this
open-air evangelism continued throughout the first two
centuries” (Green 1970:157). In an empire in which
Christianity was an officially proscribed superstitio, public
preaching would court danger for preacher and audience
alike. To be sure, there were, especially in the first two
centuries, “charismatically inclined loners” who wandered
from one community to another (Brox 1982:218). But
these appear to have taught and missionized quietly,
domestically. It is thus not surprising that the pagan
Caecelius’ view of Christianity is that of a low-profile
movement: “The Christians are a secret tribe that lurk in
darkness and shun the light, silent in public, chattering in
corners” (Minucius Felix 1931:8,4).

“Chattering in corners”—this points to the reason which
our authorities agree to affirm. Early Christians, following
their trades around the empire, intermingled purposefully
with their neighbors. Their lifestyle was one of “presence
and conspicuousness” (Brox 1982:226). While at their
jobs, they combined hard work with talking; in crowded
urban tenement buildings they met others in the stairways.
“Simply as neighbors, the Christians were naturally
everywhere” (MacMullen 1984:42). Denied a place in the
forum, the Christians were present in ordinary, workaday
settings where their character and common life were
evident to people who knew them and, on other grounds,
trusted them. On this level, “it was simply not possible or
necessary to conceal one’s prayers or worship of God from
everyone’s eyes” (Lane Fox 1986:316).

So what did the Christians have to offer their neighbors?
At this point our authorities part company. Part of the
fascination of MacMullen’s book is that he is so sure, so
simple, so categorical in his analysis. Early Christian
churches grew because the Christians, while wielding a
stick, proffered a carrot. The Christian message was stark
and unyielding. There is one God who will judge all
people with severity and condemn to everlasting torment
those who do not turn to him. But for those who, alarmed
by this prospect, do repent, God will demonstrate his
reality by works of supernatural power. Whether in heal¬
ing a diseased neighbor or cleansing a heathen shrine,
God was a God of miracles.

MacMullen recognizes that, in raising this subject, he is
trespassing on “a historiographical 'no-go’ area” (1984:27).

34

But he insists that historians should reflect, not their own
worldview, but the worldview of the people whom they
are studying. “I report as faithfully as I can what people
of that ancient time believed” (1984:24)—and not only of
that time, but of many non-Enlightenment cultures
throughout history. (In a significant aside, MacMullen sees
parallels in the West African ministry of William Wade
Harris [1984:23-24]). For example, exorcism was “possibly
the most highly rated activity of the early Christian
church.” And, when people joined the church, it was
miracles which had been “the chief instrument of
conversion” (1984:26-27). Other reasons—the message of
Christians, their apologetic writings, their lifestyle, their
martyrdoms—MacMullen deprecates. For him, the growth
of the early church was a result of supernatural acts.

What evidence does MacMullen have for his thesis?
From the post-Constantinian period he cites examples—
from Hilarion, Anthony, Martin—of “theological demon¬
strations.” Prior to Constantine, he notes that the church
in Rome, which Lane Fox had used for statistical estimates,
had among its 154 ministers no fewer than 52 exorcists.
But his primary focus is Gregory, the mid-third century

September 1990 Volume 18 Number 3

MISSION [7k

FOCUS W

33 The Growth of the Early Church: Reflections on
Recent Literature
Alan Kreider

36 Missionaries and Social Change
Joseph Liechty

39 How My Understanding of Mission Has Developed
Henry J. Schmidt

42 African Exhibit Indicts Canadian Missionaries for
Arrogance
William J. Samarin

44 In review
48 Editorial

EDITORIAL COUNCIL
Editor Wilbert R. Shenk

Review editors Hans Kasdorf, Henry J. Schmidt
Other members Peter M. Hamm, Robert L. Ramseyer

Editorial assistant Betty Kelsey

MISSION FOCUS (ISSN 0164-4696) is published quarterly at 500
S. Main St., Elkhart, Indiana, by Mennonite Board of Missions.
Single copies available without charge. Send correspondence to
Box 370, Elkhart, IN 46515-0370. Second-class postage paid at
Elkhart, Indiana, and at additional mailing offices. Lithographed in
USA. Copyright 1990 by Mennonite Board of Missions.
POSTMASTER: Send address changes to MISSION FOCUS, Box
370, Elkhart, IN 46515-0370.

bishop of Pontus in north-central Asia Minor. Between
240 and 270 this pupil of Origen did his best to spread
Christianity in this rough terrain. According to several
accounts of his life, his ministry was marked by show¬
downs with local demons in which the Christian God was
invariably victor. As a result, whereas when Gregory began
his episcopate there were 17 Christians in Pontus, by the
end there were 17 non-Christians! For subsequent gen¬
erations, Gregory of Pontus has thus come to be known
as “the Wonder-Worker.” And MacMullen suspects, al¬
though surviving evidence is admittedly lacking, that
there must have been comparable mass conversions else¬
where (1984:61).

Brox, who doesn’t mention the miraculous dimension—
and who, writing in German, is more up-to-date with
continental than Anglo-Saxon scholarship—does not eval¬
uate MacMullen’s thesis. For him, Gregory is the excep¬
tion that proves his rule—“the exception in planned
surface expansion” (Brox 1982:228). Lane Fox does grap¬
ple with MacMullen. Like MacMullen, he views Gregory
of Nyssa’s Life of Gregory of a century later as over¬
elaborated hagiography. But he also rejects the substantial
reliability of the Syriac account of Gregory’s life which is
so central to MacMullen’s analysis (Ryssel n.d.). As often
in ancient history, the scholarly debate turns on an
evaluation of evidence. Is the Syriac Life a pre-Con-
stantinian work which, despite “some nonsense,” is “oth¬
erwise acceptable on grounds of simplicity and logic”
(MacMullen 1984:145)? Or is this work “a legendary
panegyric, with its own touches of imaginary color” (Lane
Fox 1986:760)? And, hovering over it all, there is the
philosophical question—do miracles occur, and if so, how
important are they?

How do we adjudicate this dispute? My own sense,
having read the German translation of the Syriac, is that
many of the events described in it could have happened.
And, with David Aune, I observe that “magic was a
characteristic feature of early Christianity from its very
inception” (Aune 1979:1557).

But ultimately, I believe, MacMullen fails to convince
because he pushes too hard. The exorcists in Rome, for
example, were engaged in the repeated, routine exorcisms
of baptismal candidates far more than in “power contests”
with demons in the public domain. And elsewhere the
slenderness of MacMullen’s evidence is apparent. As Lane
Fox—who has rightly or wrongly discounted the Syriac
Life of Gregory—states, between the apostolic age and
Constantine “we know of no historical case when a miracle
or an exorcism turned an individual, let alone a crowd, to
the Christian faith” (1986:327).

So MacMullen’s case, it seems to me, is stimulating but
exaggerated. But while building on Brox and Lane Fox,
we must acknowledge MacMullen’s contribution. Within
a multifaceted framework of explanations of the early
church’s growth, we can give miracle a genuine but
subsidiary place.

Why then did the early churches grow? In addition to
those matters we have already discussed, Lane Fox and
Brox offer us a final reason which has to do with the
believers’ unique amalgam of message and lifestyle. The
believers conveyed their message by many forms of
persuasion. In major cities, Brox emphasizes, there were
philosophical schools, in which Justin, Clement of Alex¬
andria, and others dealt with contemporary questions and
thought patterns. There were also the writings of the
apologists: Justin, Tertullian, Athenagoras, Origen, and the

rest. To be sure, there were not many apologists; and, as
Brox points out, they were at times lacking in argument
and style. But at their best they advanced communicative
statements of the Christian faith and hope. Lane Fox,
whose knowledge of ancient literature is wide in scope,
is impressed by the apologists. In the third century, for
example, of all surviving literature, “in bulk detail the
longest texts are written by Christians with a case to plead”
(Lane Fox 1986:331,572).

But vastly more typical than the philosophers or writers,
and certainly more socially significant, were the humble
Christians who, in household or workplace, gave witness
to their faith. The pagan critic Celsus describes how they
operated: “We see in private houses workers in wool and
leather, and fullers, and persons of the most uninstructed
and rustic character, not venturing to utter a word in the
presence of their elders and wiser masters; but when they
get hold of the children privately, and certain women as
ignorant as themselves, they pour forth wonderful state¬
ments, to the effect that they ought not to give heed to
their fathers and to their teachers, but should obey them
... that they alone know how people ought to live, and
that, if the children obey them, they will both be happy
themselves, and will make their home happy also” (Origen
1872:3,55).

In this account, the centers of mission are humble—the
inner part of the ancient house (“the women’s house”) or
the workshop. The missioners, like their audiences, are
working people. They are stating a view of religion and
society that will be unacceptable to their social superiors.
And this is important practically, for their “philosophy”
impinges upon lifestyle—“they alone know how people
ought to live.” In this text as elsewhere, it is marginal
people—women and children—who are the primary re¬
cipients of this unsettling message.

The Christians’ message was unsettling, because it came
at a time when the empire’s order was beginning to
crumble from within. By the third century the imperial
coinage was being debased, order was breaking down, and
society was becoming increasingly hierarchical, as the
urban rich were being economically and legally distanced
from the rest of society. Hopelessness was widespread,
and the gods seemed powerless to address the crisis. In
this setting the Christian message spoke a word of hope—
for this world and beyond. “Among second-century au¬
thors,” Lane Fox observes, “it is the Christians who are
the most confident and assured” (1986:331).

The churches of the early centuries thus continued to
engage themselves with the task that Wayne Meeks has
found in the Pauline congregations—they “were engaged
... in constructing a new world” (Meeks 1984:192). The
Christian message involved more than propositions to
affirm; it was an invitation to live in a new way, to
participate in a new social reality which was both local
and “catholic.” It took years of apprenticeship to become
acculturated to the thought patterns and mores of this new
community. Hence the lengthy periods of catechumenate
which preceded Christian baptism (Lane Fox 1986:326).
That candidates were willing to put up with this, and to
endure the severe persecution that at times could break
out, was a sign that in the churches they found a love
which touched them in their motivational cores.

As the third century progressed, gradual changes were
taking place. In the Christian communities, numbers were
increasing. Emphases were changing as well. There was
an increasing tolerance for deviant behavior and an

35

increasing intolerance of deviant doctrine. At the same
time as there were periodic, empire-wide bursts of intense
persecution which often tore their communities apart,
there was also a growing local tolerance for the Christians.
Christians were settling down, relaxing.

But nothing that the Christians had hitherto experi¬
enced prepared them for the jolt they received in A.D.
312 when the Emperor-claimant, Constantine, embraced
their faith and a year later legalized it. With the emperor
as coreligionist, the Christian church entered a new era
in its missionary history. Assisted by methods that Mac-
Mullen, with typical vivacity, calls “flattery and battery”
(1984:119), the church throughout the fourth century
grew six-fold. Even so, over half of the empire s population
remained outside the church. So, under Theodosius II and
his successors, the violence of state and mob was directed
against persistent pagans. The result was a Christianized
society filled with “partial converts,” people who “made
such adaptations as were really necessary and kept what
they could” (MacMullen 1984:116-117). In this new era
called “Christendom,” we have traveled far from the
understandings and methods by which the early church
grew.

What is the relevance of this survey for us? It may, in
part, be a reminder of the distantness of history. The
phrase “the early church” trips seductively off our
tongues. Looking at its reality more carefully—as we have
begun to do here—makes us realize that in many ways we
would not “restore it” even if we could! I personally find
much to admire in the experience of the early Christians
but also much that puzzles me and inspires further
exploration. One such thing is the phenomenon, noted by
both MacMullen and Lane Fox, of the early Christians’
“very unsteady focus on the role of Jesus” (MacMullen
1984:20; Lane Fox, 1986:353). Other readers will note
contemporary themes or approaches which are underde¬
veloped or missing altogether among the early Christians.

There is much we can learn from the early Christians.
From the other side of the gulf of Christendom—in which
Christian missionary activity has been difficult—come
hints of other understandings which can have relevance
to our own time. Herbert Butterfield, the great Cambridge
historian, was fascinated by our position at a point in
history at which Christianity is no longer politically or

culturally compulsory. This, he felt, was a moment not for
mourning but for mission. “We are back,” he wrote, “for
the first time in something like the earliest centuries of
Christianity, and those early centuries afford some rele¬
vant clues to the kind of attitude to adopt” (Butterfield
1949:135).

So the early churches offer us not a cure-all but clues.
May we listen discerningly, and act upon what we hear.

References Cited

Aune, David

1979 “Magic in Early Christianity,” in Aufstieg und Niedergang der
Romischen Welt , II, Prinzipat, 23/2, Berlin & New York:
Walter de Gruyter, 1507-1557.

Brox, Norbert

1982 “Zur christlichen Mission in der Spatantike,” in Karl Kertelge,
ed., Mission im Neuen Testament , Quaestiones Disputate, 93,
Freiburg-im-Breisgau: Herder, 190-237.

Butterfield, Herbert

1949 Christianity and History, New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons.

Green, Michael

1970 Evangelism in the Early Church, London: Hodder and Stough¬
ton.

Harnack, Adolf von

1908 The Mission and Expansion of Christianity in the First Three
Centuries, London: Williams and Norgate.

Lane Fox, Robin

1986 Pagans and Christians, New York: A. A. Knopf; paperback
Harper & Row (1988); London: Penguin Books, 1988 (the
version used in this article).

MacMullen, Ramsay

1984 Christianizing the Roman Empire (AD 100-400), New Haven:
Yale University Press.

Meeks, Wayne A.

1984 The First Urban Christians: The Social World of the Apostle
Paul, New Haven: Yale University Press.

Minucius, Felix

1931 Octavius, ed. G. H. Rendall, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard
University Press.

Origen

1872 Contra Celsum, ed. A. Roberts and J. Donaldson, Ante-Nicene
Christian Library, 23, Edinburgh: T & T Clark

Ryssel, Victor

n.d. Eine syrische Lebensgeschichte des Gregorius Thaumaturgus,
Zurich: A. Bopp.

Wilken, Robert L.

1984 The Christians as the Romans Saw Them, New Haven: Yale
University Press.

Missionaries and Social Change

JOSEPH LIECHTY

During the first half of the nineteenth century, evangeli¬
cals led a “Protestant crusade” to convert Ireland’s major¬
ity Catholic population to Protestantism. The crusaders
came to the task with varied motivations. The motives of
some were simple and personal: transformed themselves
by an experience of personal faith, they wanted to share
this blessing with others. Other Protestants understood
themselves as working for broader social goals: in an age

Joseph Liechty and his wife, Linda, have served with Mennonite
Board of Missions in Ireland since 1979.

36

when penal laws were no longer a tenable means of social
control, they realized that “Protestant ascendancy” in
Ireland could continue only if large numbers of Catholics
became Protestants. But most Protestants seem to have
been unaware of any possible contradiction. They be¬
lieved that all their goals for individuals and for society,
spiritual and political, were entirely compatible.

While this was a crusade that shed no blood, it did create
bitter controversy. Catholics resented both the spiritual
and the political intentions of Protestants, but especially
the way the two were linked. “The Bible, without note or

comment,” said one contemporary Catholic writer, “is not
less a means of Protestant dominion than the Orange
Yeoman s military array.” The low point of sectarian
controversy came during a devastating famine (one mil¬
lion dead, one million emigrated) in the late 1840s, when
Catholics accused some Protestant missionaries of
“souperism”—distributing food, usually soup, to starving
Catholics only on condition that they become Protestants
or at least attend Bible classes. The crusade finally wound
down in the 1860s when a census revealed that half a
century of evangelistic effort, sectarian tension, social
turmoil, and emigration had left the religious profile of
Ireland essentially unaltered.

But memories of the Protestant crusade live on. I
recently attended a widely publicized book launch by a
predominantly Catholic group which hopes to channel
Catholic memories of the famine into greater worldwide
effort toward preventing and relieving famines. So far so
good, but in stimulating Catholic memories, are they
prepared to deal with the sectarian resentments that lie
just below the surface? I think not, so I have opened up
dialogue with them about how these memories of souper¬
ism can be dealt with redemptively. The national radio
network recently featured a controversy about a bitter
attack on “born-again Christians” by a Catholic priest. As
a result of the broadcast my co-worker, Mike Garde, who
ministers to persons affected by marginal religious groups,
spent much time on the phone answering questions from
confused journalists, priests, and independent Bible
church members. The high level of interest and passion
makes no sense at all except for the lingering effects of
the Protestant crusade. More than a century later, the
legacy of Protestant missionary efforts is central in shaping
Mennonite witness in Ireland!

The story of the Protestant crusade and its enduring
consequences is a sobering reminder of the complex
relationship between missionaries and social change. Mis¬
sionaries are nothing if not change agents, and yet for
various reasons we are frequently not conscious of this. A
self-conscious identity as a change agent means thinking
about the present in the light of the future; it means
reflecting on the tension between what is and what might
be. But busy lives, filled to the brim with the demands of
the present, can sometimes leave little opening for the
light of the future to shine in. Furthermore, our participa¬
tion in the modern hatred of imperialism and our appre¬
ciation for the integrity of human culture leave us
suspicious of the very idea of promoting change in another
society. This pop anthropology, coupled with our aware¬
ness of how missionaries have sometimes abused their role
as change agents, brings ambivalence about our role in
bringing about change—we may prefer to avoid giving
this topic much deliberate attention.

Ambivalence is undoubtedly a healthy mind-set to
inform the task of bringing about change. But the funda¬
mental fact remains that if we are doing our job, we are
change agents. We may not be comfortable with this, we
may not even be aware of it, but we cannot escape it. The
most low-key, culture-sensitive, self-critical missionary
stance conceivable still contains within it a change-creat¬
ing impulse. Just as inescapable, as change agents we will
work with a strategy. We are creatures of habit and
pattern, and that pattern reveals the outline of our strat¬
egy. Strategies may be intentional or unintentional, coher¬
ent or incoherent, conscious or unconscious, explicit or
implicit, but we always have a strategy. If by definition

change agents must have a strategy, we profit by facing
this directly and by devoting time and attention to clari¬
fying what goals we work toward and the strategies by
which we mean to achieve them.

One necessary starting point is understanding how the
process of change works. The ideas that follow are some
that I have developed or borrowed, principally through
the study of history. The subject of change is infinitely
complex and subtle, and every assertion can be qualified
into oblivion, but I hope these few simple points might be
helpful.

1. There is no such thing as rapid radical change. All

change is relatively slow and evolutionary, proceeding by
small increments, because the past carries a huge force of
inertia. If change has been rapid, then it only appears to
be radical, because the weight of the past cannot be held
off forever, and the apparently radical change will collapse
or succumb to a backlash. If change has been genuinely
radical, then it only appears to be rapid, and careful
examination of the change will reveal that it was a long
time in the making, and perhaps that those who brought
about the change build on hidden roots in surprising and
creative ways. Revolutions often reveal vividly this dy¬
namic of change. Many times, when the dust has settled
and the blood has stopped flowing, enormous energy, vast
suffering, and fantastic rhetoric will produce no more than
a change of regime. Even the most rigorous and brutal
efforts cannot guarantee change. Religion and ethnicity
were subjected to devastating attacks after the Bolshevik
Revolution, and yet with every passing day we seem to
find out more about how both remain vital, even explosive,
forces in the USSR. Although the staggering recent events
in eastern Europe might appear superficially to be exam¬
ples of rapid radical change, they are in fact the opposite.
Revolutionary societies were going to sweep away the
past, start over, create a New Man; but now these efforts
are crumbling, and in the rubble we find the old problems
reasserting themselves and demanding attention once
again. When a revolution is successful and to some extent
radical, it will be so because it took the time to bring along
the whole people (or at least a majority), and it will have
built on the roots of the previous society. Social change is
a slow and complex process, and we must not be fooled,
seduced, or detracted by the lure of rapid change.

2. We control change only to a very limited extent.
Because the momentum of the past is so great and the
dynamics of change are so complicated, we cannot nec¬
essarily engineer even relatively simple and straightfor¬
ward changes, and results become even more difficult to
calculate if the desired changes are radical and complex.
Sometimes, in fact, our efforts may produce results nearly
opposite what we intended. I am reminded of those early
nineteenth-century Irish Protestants who circulated the
Bible among Irish Catholic peasants, confident that it must
have a pacifying political effect, only to find that the
peasants were quite capable of searching the Scripture for
apocalyptic passages supporting their popular prophecies
about the imminent demise of Protestantism. And I think
of missionaries who have devoted great care and effort to
introducing the gospel to traditional or primal cultures,
only to find that their efforts are overtaken by, or even
contribute to, forces of modernization that destroy the
culture they wanted to serve.

3. The slowness of change and the difficulty of con¬
trolling it have basic implications for our strategies. In
the first place, if the change we seek is at all substantial,

37

we had better be prepared for the long haul. Having made
that commitment, we are confronted with a paradox: on
the one hand, we must develop our strategies for change
with all the care, wisdom, and sophistication we can
muster, so that we take into account as many factors as
possible; on the other hand, having worked hard to
develop our strategies, we must not take them too seri¬
ously, because we cannot possibly take everything into
account, and therefore our strategies may not serve the
ends we desire. Holding these attitudes together is ex¬
tremely difficult—we are likely to become quite attached
to the strategies in which we invested so much effort—but
it must be done, because our attachment can work against
our goals. To avoid the trap of idolatrous infatuation with
particular strategies, we must realize that every long-term
plan can only be provisional. The idea that we can attain
a distant end through a complex series of steps is an
extremely dangerous illusion. Therefore, while keeping
distant goals in mind, we must be comfortable taking small
and relatively calculable steps, and we must be satisfied
that the next small step we take has integrity in and of
itself, that ends and means are in perfect harmony. Then
we must continually reevaluate our strategies. Is our goal
still the same? Has the situation changed so that our
strategy needs to be altered? Patience and flexibility are
essential qualities in those who seek change.

4. The raw material a change agent works with is the
present. But we will only understand the present in a
superficial and probably deceptive way unless we know
the course by which the present came to be. Therefore,
because knowledge of the past is our most basic tool for
understanding the present, every missionary must pay
attention to history. Granted, I come with a particular bias
on this point, having spent several years working for a
Ph.D. in Irish history as a way of strengthening Mennonite
witness in Ireland. During the course of my studies I
occasionally asked myself, can I justify my studies to MBM,
MCC, and the Mennonite church? However, having
finished the degree and begun applying what I learned,
I am inclined to reverse the question: Could the Menno¬
nite church justify witness in Ireland without having
someone study Irish history? No, I am not suggesting that
every missionary needs a Ph.D. in history. There are many
good ways (including nonacademic ways) of gaining a
grasp of the past, and furthermore some people can do
this work on behalf of others. But by whatever means
acquired, a sense of the past is essential to missionary
work.

5. However, not just any sense of the past will serve
missionary purposes. Attitudes toward the past run along
a continuum between ignoring the past and worshiping
it. Ignoring the past is obviously foolish, because it will
lead to shallow analysis and ill-conceived change. But a
reactionary reverence for the past is an equally dangerous
attitude with many adherents. Especially in times of great
social tension, false prophets appear who are so overcome
by the problems of society that they can do no more than
shout, “Stop and return to the old ways!” But even if some
past situation were genuinely more desirable than the
present, the huge momentum of the past works against
returning as surely as it does against radical change. In
fact, advocates of reactionary reverence for the past and
advocates of rapid, radical change are working with
essentially the same dangerously ahistorical assumptions,
however different their goals. What missionaries require
is a stance of creative transformation, which will look to
the future without ignoring the past, and look to the past
without being bound by it. In this we have no better model
than Jesus, who came to fulfill the law, not abolish it, but
whose creative transformations of Jewish tradition were
so surprising that many of those who believed they were
friends of the law took Jesus to be an enemy of the law.

Even so brief a discussion of the nature of change carries
with it some obvious demands on those who would
promote change. To be a change agent is an awesome and
humbling task. “Nothing is worth doing which can be
achieved in our lifetime, therefore we must be saved by
hope,” said Reinhold Niebuhr. “Nothing which is true or
beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate
context of history: therefore we must be saved by faith”
(1952:63). These are words every missionary should re¬
member. Our capacity for self-deception is so great, the
possibilities for being overwhelmed or co-opted by other
forces are so vast, and the process of change is so complex
and subtle, that unless we approach our work utterly
without triumphalism, with hope and with patience, in
prayer and in faith, we may very well do more harm than
good. It is our responsibility to be aware of the nature of
change, informed by a sense of the past, and armed with
thoughtful strategies. But the journey that must begin with
the very best work we can offer must end in faith that
God will use it for his purposes.

Reference Cited

Niebuhr, Reinhold

1952 The Irony of American History, New York: Charles Scribners.

38

How My Understanding of Mission Has Developed

HENRY J. SCHMIDT

My initial interest in mission was fostered in our home,
which was the “watering hole” for many missionaries and
itinerant preachers who came to minister in our small,
rural church. During my childhood years I recall fearing
that if I really surrendered myself to God, he would send
me to Africa. Although my understanding of mission was
limited, I was sure that Africa was not my preference.
Several years of Bible Institute and a particular recommit¬
ment experience at age 18 forced me to rethink my
concept of God and of his mission in the world. I began
to understand the depth of God’s love, God’s concern for
the reconciliation of all people to himself through Christ,
and God’s mission of sharing that good news through a
transformed church, and was ready to become involved
in God’s global concern. God, I realized, does not punish
obedience, and mission has little to do with location or
vocation but everything to do with obedience. To be what
God calls and gifts one to be obviously has a price, but it
is more a privilege than a sacrifice. The motto of my life
became focused: “The will of God: nothing more, nothing
less, and nothing else.”

Over the years my interest in mission intensified but the
exact expression of that commitment has been full of
surprises. My wife and I declared our willingness to serve
overseas and were prepared to go to India in 1964, but
circumstances closed that door. Our commitment to mis¬
sion has subsequently expressed itself in pastoring, church
planting, itinerant evangelist work, mission conferences,
and evangelism seminars in North America. International
mission work has included short-term preaching/teach-
ing/study assignments on all continents. For the past
fifteen years I have been teaching mission and training
pastors/missionaries at our denominational seminary—an
assignment I had never considered in planning my career.
My understanding of mission in the world has emerged
in the context of struggle, study, global exposure, ministry
experience, and the patient tutelage of godly teachers.

Finding the centerpiece of God's mission

Over the years my mission theology is increasingly rooted
in God-consciousness, God-centeredness, and God-sent-
ness. Earlier concepts of mission focused around the
people’s lostness, the desperate human dilemma, and a
sense of obligation to share good news with people. While
I still affirm these, the most dynamic mission is motivated
by a God-centered perspective which grows out of a
relationship with a sending God. It is God who made the
first move in creation (Gen. 1) and in our redemption by
sending Jesus Christ (John 3:16). It is God who sends us
into the world as he sent his own Son (John 20:21). It is
God who empowers us with his authority in mission (Matt.
28:18-20). The greatest motivation in mission comes from
a Trinitarian focus; a God-centered initiative, a Christ-cen¬
tered message, and the Holy Spirit’s empowerment. This
does not downplay the lostness or desperate plight of
humanity—it focuses the centerpiece of our mission.

Henry J. Schmidt is associate professor of World Mission and
director for the Center for Training in Mission/Evangelism at the
Mennonite Brethren Biblical Seminary , Fresno , California.

Discovering the centrality of the church in mission

My earlier orientation in evangelical Christianity placed
a lot of emphasis on personal conversion and evangelism
but didn’t always relate them strongly to the church. Early
theological training tended to stress mission as personal
evangelism, winning individuals, and sharing good news—
often apart from the establishment of churches and the
corporate mission responsibility. In seminary my theology
of church was revamped. I realized that the church was
not peripheral but central to God’s mission in the world.
The Pauline pattern of emphasizing personal conversion
(moral change) and of establishing local congregations
(for Christian nurture and mission), places evangelism at
the heart of the church’s mission. While I gratefully
acknowledge the strength of para-church organizations in
their clear evangelistic zeal and focus, I struggle with their
theology of the church.

My conversion to the centrality of the church in mission
had several personal implications. As a pastor and itinerant
evangelist I began to have second thoughts about estab¬
lishing my own interdenominational evangelistic organi¬
zation. I chose rather to function in an evangelism ministry
that was anchored within a local church, a denomination,
and in the seminary community. Furthermore, my gradu¬
ate program at the University of Southern California
forced me to reevaluate my commitment to the church. I
was suddenly faced with a host of people who believed
in the church as strongly as I did, but for different reasons.
They viewed the church as crucial without characterizing
it as having a divine mandate, a supernatural character, or
a strong sense of mission. To them the church was
significant because of its historic role in shaping social
ethics through biblical interpretation and its present
function of socializing people into a community. While I
had no quarrel with the church being a sociological or
hermeneutical community, my theology of church focused
its origin, character, and mission beyond those human
categories.

Focusing mission vision through spiritual renewal

From my early ministry I have been concerned with
spiritual renewal in the church and its implications for
mission vision. The evidences of institutionalization and
routinization in the church are all too evident. The fact
that North America has 350,000 churches, 80-85 percent
of which have plateaued or are declining in attendance,
is one indicator of institutionalization. The fact that those
same churches experienced their most significant growth
in the first ten years of history, and that most never exceed
their membership size at the fifteenth year, speaks of a
loss of mission vision and momentum.

In his article, Church Renewal That Lasts , Howard
Snyder suggests that renewal must be personal and cor¬
porate to be genuine, structural and ideological to be
ongoing, and missional in focus to be long lasting (Snyder
1984). My earlier understanding of mission assumed the
priority of the first two, with an almost exclusive emphasis
on the pietistic, spiritual, and personal dimensions of
renewal. Such renewal, however, was short-lived. I do not
question the genuineness of personal and corporate re¬
newal, but I have come to see that if ideas, structures, and

39

mission vision in the church are not affected, genuine
renewal is aborted. The “principalities and powers’’ which
Paul addresses in Ephesians are not only present in the
unjust social structures and political regimes in society,
they also keep the church in captivity.

I concur with Ray Bakke’s observation, based on his
study of eighty world-class cities, that the primary reasons
for urban churches’ ineffectiveness are internal—lack of
sensitivity to need, vision, and structures, focus on main¬
tenance over mission, inflexibility—rather than external—
unresponsiveness of people, resistance to the gospel. “We
never did it this way before’’ are the seven last words of
too many churches who won’t pay the price of ongoing
and long lasting renewal.

Combining evangelistic zeal with a social conscience

My earlier itinerant ministry reflected a strong evangelis¬
tic zeal and a concern for personal conversion. It was
based on several faulty assumptions. I viewed sin primarily
as personal and individual, not corporate and structural. I
was convinced that if people got right with God they
would “do justly, seek mercy, and walk humbly before the
Lord their God’’ (Mic. 6:8). I focused the task of the
church on bringing people good news and helping them
spiritually rather than on ministering to their physical
needs. Time and exposure have helped me see the depth
of sin both in individuals and in social structures. I found
that the converted don’t automatically have a social
conscience and the “trickle-down theory’’ doesn’t work
any better in the church than it does in economics.

The bedrock of my mission theology remains un¬
changed, namely, that spiritual change and personal con¬
version are fundamental to structural and social change.
However, my study of Scripture, urban sociology, and the
growth of global poverty forced me to rethink the dichot¬
omies between evangelism and social action; spiritual and
physical need; word and deed. My middle-class, North
American assumptions that education, proper health facil¬
ities, adequate housing, good employment, and reliable
transportation existed for all were challenged by the
world’s two billion people living in poverty. A holistic
ministry emphasis in evangelism and church planting is
not optional to mission in the world. Viv Grigg’s charge
that “the church has given the poor bread and kept the
bread of life for the middle class” (Grigg 1987:17) calls
for the church to commit itself intentionally to gospel
proclamation and demonstration, and to establishing com¬
munities of hope among the marginalized in the world. It
will take a new breed of missionaries who will take the
vow of poverty, chastity, and obedience to build churches
among the poor.

Reprioritizing mission in view of globalization/urbaniza¬
tion

With my small, rural, family-oriented church background,
ministry in the city represented a new frontier in mission.
The pluralism, diversity, mobility, rapid change, secular¬
ization, and schedules of the city challenge the church’s
role as the “hub” of community life in a way I was not
accustomed to from my rural past. Although my commit¬
ment to mission was strong, my vision and view of cities
and urban churches needed drastic revision. I needed to
be converted from my negative perspective of the city as
evil—i.e., dirty, depraved, and deprived—to see it as a
place of unprecedented opportunity for mission. I had to
acknowledge that rural churches which were built on the
40

values of status quo, sameness, smallness, stability, and
harmony would look different than urban churches which
are characterized more by change, diversity, conflict-man¬
agement, bigness, and mobility. The point is not that one
is good and the other is bad; they are different, and each
requires its own strategy. The issue is not personal pref¬
erence but effectiveness and contextual compatibility.

In his providence God is allowing this generation to be
a part of three major sociological movements which affect
our mission:

1. The urbanization of the world. Currently 42 percent
of the world’s five billion people live in cities. It is
projected that by 2025 the number will increase to 55
percent and half of these will live in poverty.

2. The Asianization of the world. Today one out of every
two people born is Asian.

3. The internationalization of the world. Every city of the
world is a cosmopolitan mix of different people and
language groups, be it the 125 language groups in the Los
Angeles school system, the one million Japanese in Sao
Paulo, or the Algerians who comprise 12 percent of the
total population of Paris.

These factors have major implications for mission strat¬
egy. First, it means that this is God’s hour in the city. In
the midst of mobility, social upheaval, and massive urban
migrations people are more open to the gospel. Our
mission must focus on the city because that is where the
people are. Second, our mission will have to take more
seriously the unreached people groups in North America.
The old dichotomies of “home” and “foreign” mission
must cease. Historically, our denomination has mission-
ized best overseas and among religious and cultural groups
with whom we had some affinity—i.e., German Menno-
nites, Lutherans, Baptists. Until the 1970s we gave little
priority to ministry to other near neighbor ethnic groups.
Our commitment to mission must place priority on the
mission field at our doorstep—the 200 language groups in
North America who will not be reached with English as
the primary language, the international students, and the
new arrivals to our shores—including the ten million
Chinese anticipated after 1997.

Developing mission partnerships in view of a shifting
center

As a part of the Western church, which has been on the
forefront of mission sending for the past century, it has
been hard for me to face the fact that the center of gravity
in mission is also shifting. The decline of the West as a
primary economic and political player on the world scene
and the rapid growth of the church in the two-thirds world
changes one’s perspective on mission. For nineteen cen¬
turies following the resurrection of Jesus Christ, Christi¬
anity grew to embrace one-third of all humanity—yet
more than 80 percent of these were white in 1900. The
year 1980 was a watershed for evangelicals, because for
the first time the percentage of evangelicals in the
two-thirds world came to equal the number in the West.
Within five years, the percentage changed to 66 percent
in the two-thirds world and 34 percent in the West.

This shift in the center of gravity calls for a new
partnership and empowerment in mission. It will test the
mission motivation, commitment, and perspective of the
Western church in an unprecedented way. It calls the
Western church to be a partner in mission from a minority
people and mission force perspective. Already two-thirds
world Christians outnumber those in the Western church

and by 2000 their mission agencies and missionaries will
exceed ours. Even though the West may still be a domi¬
nant economic force in world mission it raises many
questions about how we view partnership. Will Western
dollars support only Western missionaries? Will we sup¬
port financially only what we control? Do missionized
people and national conferences relate to the Western
church on an indigenous basis or through our mission
boards? Does partnership mean working together in
global tasks through empowerment that comes from inter¬
national teams, boards, and cooperation? Must the next
phase of global mission not assume that the gospel will be
carried by culturally blended mission teams, with West¬
erners in the minority?

Understanding spiritual warfare and empowerment in
mission

While I have always believed that the Holy Spirit s
empowerment for mission was crucial for effectiveness,
until recently the issue was a more academic and less
practical reality. My earlier dispensational theology
tended to reinforce a more conservative stance toward
the Spirit s role in gifting, releasing, and empowering
people for ministry. In the past decade I have concluded
that among Western Christians, too many are “living on
the right side of Calvary but the wrong side of Pentecost.”
The issue is not one of preoccupation with the sign gifts,
miracles, dramatic healings, or the doctrine of the Holy
Spirit as an end in itself. It is an issue of spiritual
preparation and empowerment for spiritual warfare.

My recent trip to Latin America brought me face to face
with the reality that the fastest growing churches in Sao
Paulo, Bogota, and Guadalajara are independent charis¬
matic congregations. In Latin America the church is
growing three times faster than the population. When I
probed for reasons behind the growth of the independent,
charismatic churches over other equally fundamental,
evangelical mission agencies I was told, “The evangelicals
believe in the Holy Spirit as a doctrine, but Pentecostals
encounter the Holy Spirit as reality in their daily experi¬
ence.” Spiritist centers outnumber evangelical churches
among Sao Paulo’s seventeen million people by a ratio of
five to one. The only hope for breaking this stronghold is
the Spirit’s empowerment for deliverance. For me it is no
surprise that a more charismatically oriented theology and
worship style attracts Brazilians. Brazilians are warm,
emotive, expressive, and relational; their natural affinity is
toward a charismatic theology and expression. Addition¬
ally, spiritism and the supernatural are a part of Brazilian
culture and thinking. Since they connect day-to-day hap¬
penings with the miraculous and the supernatural in a
spiritist culture, they also look for supernatural manifesta¬
tions of God’s power in Christianity.

In an interview with three Catholic priests in a base
community, I asked what the charismatic renewal move¬
ment had done in the Roman Catholic Church. Their
response was candid, “It has freed the church to become
more Brazilian in showing warmth and emotion in our
worship. It has brought new life and vitality to the church
by emphasizing a greater openness to the gifts beyond the
seven sacraments. It has brought a strong evangelization
emphasis into the Catholic Church.”

Obviously the Spirit does not only empower for mission.
The Spirit gives the gifts of wisdom and discernment so
that in the exercise of all gifts the church is edified, Christ
is exalted, and the kingdom is extended. My point is that

mission in North America and in other parts of the world
has not taken seriously enough the role of the Holy Spirit
for empowerment. I have much to learn about the Spirit’s
role in intercession, spiritual warfare, and healing. The key
lies in a greater openness to and expectancy of the Spirit’s
manifestation in ministry.

Leadership development as a priority in mission

There were basically two reasons for my shift from being
a full-time itinerant evangelist and part-time teacher to a
reversal of those roles in the mid-70s. First was a growing
recognition that mass evangelism as a primary strategy in
North America was ineffective in reaching and incorpo¬
rating new people into the church. Second was the
realization that I needed to impact pastors and church
leaders if the church was to be mobilized in mission. D.
L. Moody said, “It is better to train ten people than to do
the work of ten people.” My singular focus at seminary
has been to develop leaders with a heart for evangelism,
a vision for mission, and a multiplication mind-set.

Over the years I have come to realize that church
planting is the single most effective evangelistic strategy.
The reasons are not difficult to discern. First, new
churches start with a clear vision and commitment to
reach new people. Second, statistical evidence for the
ratio of conversions to membership is on the side of
churches less than five years old rather than older estab¬
lished churches. Furthermore, new churches are usually
more flexible, creative, and mobile in how they do church
planting, and therefore reach population segments not
being attracted by existing congregations. However,
church planting without leadership development that is
culturally indigenous will short-circuit church growth and
multiplication. Perhaps the greatest contribution North
Americans can make to the mushrooming two-thirds world
church is to help with leadership training and develop¬
ment.

Training for mission that is life and ministry related

If the primary role of North American missionaries is not
only to plant churches but to serve as catalytic leaders and
equippers of national workers, then our training institu¬
tions and models will also have to change. Since mission
in the next decades will be more cross-cultural on every
continent, then training must incorporate not only the
Western, philosophical, rational, and theoretical base, but
it must educate leaders in a life, ministry, and experiential
base. Training must be formation, not only information.
While all missionaries may not be seminary-trained, they
must develop skills in personal formation, evangelism,
church planting, discipling, holistic ministries, and cross-
cultural communication. However, regardless of formal
education, overseas mission ministry should be based on
cross-cultural and leadership development experience in
their sending church context. Missionaries cannot be
expected to do overseas what they have not demonstrated,
modeled, experienced, and tested at the sending base.
Furthermore, if two billion people are unreached and
unreachable through conventional missionaries, then we
will need to train a whole new mission force that pene¬
trates other countries, cultures, and religions through
professional and more informal channels.

Developing diverse and flexible mission strategies

It has been suggested that the dual temptation of the
church in every generation is “to change its message or

41

to refuse to change its methods.” With the shift from rural
to urban and the breakdown of the “home” and “foreign”
mission dichotomies, strategies must also change. It takes
many different kinds of churches to reach different kinds
of people. Good news must be contextualized in culturally
appropriate ways to reach different peoples, even in the
same city. Craig Ellison’s call for greater flexibility on how
we “do church” in the city is timely: “Our ministries will
be ineffective if we cherish racial/ethnic composition, our
order of worship, our meeting schedules, our style of music
and preaching more than those who need the Savior but
are kept out of the kingdom because we are unwilling to
make changes that would draw them to Christ” (Ellison
1985:17). The church does not lack for opportunity in
mission but it struggles with changing strategies to meet
changing needs. There are at least four neglected people
groups that will not be reached through traditional church
styles and strategies: the different ethnic/cultural/lan¬

guage peoples; the poor and marginalized; the multifamily
housing unit dwellers (condominiums, high-rises, govern¬
ment housing projects); and the “baby boomers” (people
born between 1946 and 1964). Mission strategies in the
next decades cannot be standardized and applied unilat¬
erally. They will have to become more diverse and more
focused on specific people groups if the church is “to win
as many as possible” (1 Cor. 9:19).

References Cited

Ellison, Craig

1985 “Attitudes and Urban Transition,” Urban Mission (Vol. 2, No.
3), 14-26.

Grigg, Viv

1987 “Sorry the Frontier Moved,” Urban Mission (Vol. 4, No. 4),
12-25.

Snyder, Howard

1984 “Renewal That Lasts,” Leadership (Vol. 5. No. 3), 90-93.

African Exhibit Indicts Canadian Missionaries for Arrogance

WILLIAM J. SAMARIN

The following article responds to an exhibition that has
attracted considerable attention. It highlights the continu¬
ing tendentious treatment accorded missions in the public
forum. In February and March 1990 the British Broadcast¬
ing Corporation televised a six-part series, “ Missionaries , ”
and published an illustrated book containing the complete
text of the broadcast. It , too , was marked by an air of
cynicism and condescension while telling the story in a
highly selective manner. Reprinted by permission from
Christian Week, Winnipeg, Manitoba.

While coalitions of persons of African ancestry have
been demonstrating at the ROM (Royal Ontario Museum)
in Toronto over what they consider the racist nature of
the exhibit, “Into the Heart of Africa,” Christians and
missionary societies have been silent.

Many would be justified in being offended at the
characterization of Canadian missionary work in Africa in
the 19th and early 20th centuries.

The exhibit, which opened last November and continues
until early August, claims to “celebrate the rich cultural
heritage of African life,” while asserting that Canadians in
Africa misunderstood and denigrated African culture and
African worldviews.

Missionaries are the chief objects of criticism, de¬
nounced for their “paternalism and cultural arrogance.”
Many of the objects on display were donations by mission¬
aries and missionary societies serving in Nigeria, Zaire,
and Angola, such as Thomas Titcombe, Joseph Blakeney,
and Walter T. Currie. The focus is entirely on Protestants.

Overblown

These artifacts, curator Jeanne Cannizzo claims, “often
reveal almost as much about the missionary worldview as

Dr. William J. Samarin, professor of Linguistic Anthropology at
the University of Toronto, is author of The Black Mans Burden:
African Colonial Labor on the Congo and Ubangi Rivers 1880-
1900 (1989).

42

they do about African beliefs and cultural practices”—an
overblown statement unless it means only that Protestants
believed that Africans lived in paganism from which they
had to be saved.

Although conversion to Christianity is recognized as the
chief goal of missionary work, it also sought, the exhibit
claims, to civilize Africans by replacing their traditional
customs and material culture with European ones, like
eating with fork and spoon and living in square houses.
Missionaries were motivated by a “sense of cultural supe¬
riority.”

The exhibit, poorly documented from missionary publi¬
cations and archives, is specious for its stereotypical view
of Christian missions, and it is guilty of making wrong
interpretations, blatant contradictions, and frequent spec¬
ulations in support of its propaganda.

A photograph of a group of women at Chisamba, Angola,
in 1895, shows some of them in the “sort of dress preferred
by missionaries” although European cloth was a trade item
that, Africans were enthusiastic about, and the blouse that
only one woman wears above a wrap-around skirt in the
native manner might have been a gift in payment for food
brought by the woman.

The caption also claims that Africans were taught to
cultivate bananas, as if they had known nothing about this
staple. Even if bananas were new to the area, they may
have been introduced to the mission village to improve
the people’s diet.

Square houses and outdoor hearths, it goes on to say,
“might be further ‘improvements’ suggested by Canadian
missionaries,” ignoring the fact that cooking outdoors was
traditional before Europeans arrived and Angola had been
colonized by the Portuguese since the 15th century.

A photograph of Mrs. Thomas Titcombe “offering ‘a
lesson in how to wash clothes’ to Yagba women in northern
Nigeria about 1915,” implies that African women had to
be taught cleanliness, and ignores the possibility that these
were mission station employees, part or full time, who

were being taught to do the task in a certain manner. Soap
was probably introduced to Africa by the Portuguese at
the same time that European fabrics were.

Kinship ties

Changes supposedly introduced by missionaries are de¬
scribed as ‘‘profoundly disruptive,” such as the houses that
were meant for nuclear families, in spite of the fact that
it was the Portuguese who encouraged the construction
of such houses by not taxing them, as they did the
traditional kind of African dwelling.

If the missionaries had anything to do with guiding the
members of the mission community, they were undoubt¬
edly helping the people to avoid the repressive ordinances
issued by the colonial government.

In any case, anybody with any experience in Africa
knows that African family life, with differences between
rural and urban settings, still depends on the kinship
system.

While the exhibit depicts missionaries as arrogant colo¬
nialists, interested in portraying Africans in the worst
possible light, so as to raise funds for their missions, the
curator, whom one journalist has called an anthropologist,
seems puzzled by the beautiful objects that missionaries
also brought back. Rev. Currie collected dozens of beau¬
tiful baskets and both combs and hairpins of fine crafts¬
manship and design, and Rev. T. Hope Morgan brought
back exquisite Kuba textiles.

Curator Cannizzo ignores the fact that Canadian mis¬
sionaries were quite as capable as others of appreciating
indigenous art.

Although slave shackles and whips are displayed, little
is made of the role that missionaries played in abolishing
slavery. Indeed, rather than commending missionaries for
their humanitarianism, they are said to have sought an end
to the slave trade only to replace it with “legitimate
commerce.”

Missionaries in the first decade of this century contrib¬
uted greatly to the condemnation of the barbarous treat¬
ment of Africans in the Congo Free State where they were
forced to collect wild rubber, as archives of the Baptist
Historical Society in Rochester, New York, make clear for
what is now Zaire.

Uninformed and biased

So naive, uninformed, and biased is the exhibit that in
commenting on the weapons in the exhibit (spears, throw¬
ing knives, and the like), it depicts Africans as having been
relatively unwarlike and non-expansionist. It portrays a
romantic Africa, where pastoralists defended their herds
from human and animal predators and farmers protected
the family fields.

Nineteenth century accounts of central Africa report
raids and skirmishes of terrible savagery, when bodies
would be mutilated. (They lived, of course, before the wars
that ‘civilized’ human beings conducted in this century,
equally, if not more, savage.)

It was generally believed, by Europeans (although I

have yet to find a Protestant missionary sharing this view)
that Africans indulged in cannibalism, although the extent
of it and the reasons for it, if true at all, are matters that
scholars are still debating.

Missionaries, as all human beings, are not entirely free
of the worldviews that characterize their societies and
cultures. For that reason they have made mistakes. In the
15th and 16th centuries the Portuguese brought African
slaves to Portugal sincerely believing in some cases that
they were assuring them of a better life and a better future
life as Christians.

Many missionaries in recent years, both Catholic and
Protestant, have been very much aware of the possible
consequences of the work they undertake. They have
sought to minimize the far-reaching effects of cultural
change, and tried to protect, as much as anthropologists
try to, from exploitation by powerful landowners.

Missionaries have not always and everywhere obliged
people to wear more clothing. Jack E. Phillips, director of
SIM (formerly Sudan Interior Mission, founded in Can¬
ada), a missionary for 20 years in Nigeria, says that it was
Nigerian Christians who insisted that Christians dress up,
criticizing missionaries for keeping their people in a
“backward,” that is, non-European, state.

One group of missionaries in Chad, while insisting, on
doctrinal grounds, that women cover their heads in church
(which they did with a gourd), allowed both men and
women to come stark naked, as was their habit at that
time.

Low esteem

There is no doubt that throughout the history of the West,
people of other lands, once called “primitives,” were held
in low esteem. A feeling of cultural superiority is, of course,
not limited to Christians.

By the time the exhibit leaves Toronto, at least 40,000
people will have viewed the objects, read the comments
and possibly bought the catalog. This unbalanced exhibit,
which is an injustice to the missionaries who gave the
objects in good faith, will be seen next at the Canadian
Museum of Civilization (Ottawa-Hull), the Vancouver
Museum, the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles
County, and the Albuquerque Museum.

After this tour of North America a million persons or
more will have been exposed to a journalistic, simplistic,
and biased presentation of missions in Africa.

Christians have as much right to share their beliefs with
others as Marxists do, but in doing so they have over the
centuries made many mistakes. Literature that makes all
missionaries heroic saints denies what is evident to all but
the most naive: missionaries are just people.

Critical analyses of missions, as well as the imperialism
of Islam, are necessary for getting at the truth of history
and human behavior. It is deplorable, nonetheless, that a
public institution should exploit what should be a tribute
to Africans as an opportunity to reinforce the stereotype
of the missionary as an ethnocentric, bigoted, and insen¬
sitive person.

43

In Review

Theology, Politics , and Peace. Edited by
Theodore Runyon. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis
Books, 1989, 199 pp., $16.95.

Reviewed by Abe Dueck

This volume brings together lectures of
a variety of politicians and theologians who
met for a conference at the Carter Center
of Emory University in 1988. Part I pro¬
vides the political perspectives of politi¬
cians from three continents—Europe,
Latin America, and North America—with
the keynote address by Jimmy Carter.

Part II has a parallel theological division,
with lectures by Juergen Moltmann, repre¬
senting the European theology of hope;
Jose Miguez Bonino, representing the
Latin American liberation theology per¬
spective; and Theodore R. Weber, repre¬
senting the North American Christian
realist perspective.

Part III, entitled “Other Voices,” en¬
hances the dialogue with relatively brief
essays by twelve other politicians and theo¬
logians, including such notables as Andrew
Young and John Howard Yoder.

While the perspectives offered are often
in stark opposition to each other, the book
reveals a common deep sense of urgency of
the pursuit of peace in a global context where
theological and religious views are so diverse.
As Moltmann contends, ours is the first
common age of all people because of the
threat of nuclear armaments. But even when
the threat of nuclear annihilation subsides
temporarily, as it may have, the truth is
nevertheless that the issues of social and
economic injustice are global issues which
threaten the peace of everyone.

Runyon provides a helpful introductory
essay which summarizes the points of
agreement and disagreement between the
various contributors. The main points of
consensus include the fact that an increase
in political, economic, and ecological jus¬
tice are essential to stable peace, and that
mutual security and mutual self-interest
must be recognized to achieve peace.

The essays are an encouraging sign that
theologians and politicians are beginning
to see the need for increased dialogue if
there is to be any hope for the future. It is
unfortunate that, except in a few cases,
there is little sense of direct dialogue
between the participants at the confer¬
ence—the essays stand in relative isolation
from each other.

Abe Dueck teaches at the Mennonite Brethren
Bible College in Winnipeg Manitoba, Canada.

44

Faith Sharing. By H. Eddie Fox and
George E. Morris. Grand Rapids, MI: Fran¬
cis Asbury Press, 1986, 131 pp., $7.95 (pb)

Reviewed by James Nikkei

This is a pleasant change from many “how¬
to” books on witness and faith sharing. The
book is written against the backdrop of the
church growth movement and uses both
theory and practice of that approach.

The authors attempt to turn non-growing
churches back to a faith-sharing situation.
They define faith sharing as one distin¬
guishing characteristic of a Bible-believing
church, lay out the theological motive and
understanding for faith sharing, effectively
describe it as the central theme of Scrip¬
ture with God as initiator, and claim that
only faith sharing assures constant infusion
of new Christians into the fellowship,
thereby keeping alive the spiritual vitality
and growth of the body of Christ.

The writers analyze the various miscon¬
ceptions and barriers of faith in order to
move from merely having a belief system
or dogma to a living practicing faith. The
book attempts to bring clarity to faulty
images of faith acceptance and sharing.

By definition, this book follows a procla¬
mation rather than a harvest theology, thus
removing fret over results. The authors
make a strong case for the gospel being
both visible and verbal, working and wait¬
ing. The book maintains a good balance of
practical guidance and theological reflec¬
tion. It can be used for small group or
personal witness orientation and should be
read by every pastor.

James Nikkei is executive director of the
Board of Evangelism for the Canadian
Mennonite Brethren Conference.

World Christians: Eastern Europe. Edited
by Philip Walters. Monrovia, CA: MARC
International, 1988, 313 pp., $15.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Hans Kasdorf

Here, for the first time in history, is an
updated source of information on the state
of Christianity in nine Eastern European
countries, including about 90 pages on the
Soviet Union. Philip Walters, the editor, is
Director of Research at Keston College, a
globally recognized center for objective
reporting on the church in the Soviet
Union and—until recent times—her East¬

ern European communist allies.

Following the foreword by Keston Col¬
lege founder Michael Bourdeaux and a
six-page introduction by the editor, the
book gives a panoramic overview of the
Soviet Union, Poland, Hungary, Czechoslo¬
vakia, the German Democratic Republic,
Albania, Romania, Bulgaria, and Yugosla¬
via. The book concludes with notes and “A
Few Words About Keston College.”

Varying in detail and length of descrip¬
tion, each chapter offers a profile of the
country in terms of geography, people,
history, economy, social conditions, and
political life. Following this contextual in¬
formation is one section on “The Status of
Christianity,” one on “The Various
Churches and Denominations” (even the
Mennonites are mentioned, pp. 86-87),
and one on “Christian Activities.” This last
part includes such aspects as evangelism
and mission; broadcasting; literature pro¬
duction and distribution (official and unof¬
ficial); Bible translation and availability (or
the need for Bibles); education of adults,
youth, and children; social concerns of the
church, and more.

I have four observations: first, while the
book is packed with information, it main¬
tains a consistent readable style without
creating the impression of a demographic
data bank. Second, the reader is also re¬
minded of the rapid changes which have
taken place since the terms glasnost and
perestroika have become watchwords of
international significance. Third, one must
also remember that the bulk of material for
this book was compiled before much of the
communism ideology had collapsed, gov¬
ernments had fallen, and the “great wall”
had crumbled. Finally, anyone concerned
about the church and its mission in Eastern
Europe will find here a source of informa¬
tion that will inspire and motivate to par¬
ticipation in the missionary challenge of
today.

Hans Kasdorf is professor of World Mission
at Mennonite Brethren Biblical Seminary in
Fresno, California.

The Puzzle of the Soviet Church: An
Inside Look at Christianity and Glasnost.
By Kent R. Hill. Portland: Multnomah,
1989, 417 pp, $14.95.

Reviewed by Hans Kasdorf

The subtitle is misleading. While the au¬
thor was a player on stage in the freeing
of the “Siberian Seven,” and while he is
certainly knowledgeable about the Soviet
scene, he can hardly claim to give an
“inside look”; he simply looks in.

Ever since the terms glasnost and per¬
estroika became watchwords in many lan¬
guages of the free world, the church in the
Soviet Union may still be a “puzzle,” as Hill
contends, but it is no longer a mystery. Just
as the Berlin Wall has crumbled, so the
Iron Curtain has been lifted and the long
silence about the church is broken.

But that does not alter the value of the
book. Already in the 1970s we saw an
increasing number of books, monographs,
and articles appear in the West about
Christian fate and faith under Soviet total¬
itarianism. The focus was largely on the
suffering church. And that was justified.
But when Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn as a true
insider wrote The Gulag Archipelago (I and
II), a new genre in church history began
to appear: scientific, documented ac¬
counts. Walter Sawatzky’s Soviet Evangeli¬
cals Since World War II (Herald, 1981)
paved the way and is by now a “classic.”

During the last five years dozens of
books have appeared in Russian, French,
German, and English. All are telling the
story of the church in different aspects and
from different perspectives; they speak of
its trials and its triumph. The book under
re\iew is another attempt to tell that story.
Several observations are in place.

1. Hill s delineation of the political con¬
text is commendable. He takes the reader
into the arena of conflict between belief
and unbelief; it is a struggle between life
and death.

2. The historical account is well docu¬
mented. This applies particularly to section
three describing the “Church and State”
from 1917 to 1985. Hill correctly identifies
the first twelve years after the Revolution
as the “Golden Age” for the evangelicals
and the 1929/39 decade as the “Nightmare
Years.”

3. The section on “Western Responses
to Christians in the USSR” is well done.
While the first part reinforces Walter
Sawatzky’s contention that the World
Council of Churches was politically biased
in support of the Soviet measures against
the church, the second part goes beyond

Sawatzky by updating the record and by
pointing to “Prospects for More Responsi¬
ble Policies.”

4. Hill’s case study of the “Siberian
Seven” reads almost like a mystery novel.
It is a story of the seven Pentecostals who
by choice lived for five years in the
“prison” of the American embassy in Mos¬
cow. Hill’s assessment of the American
response is less than complimentary.

5. One can also appreciate the author’s
cautious response to the legend that
Gorbachev may be a “secret believer.”
Even if he “is neither a secret believer nor
a King Cyrus, it is still possible that per¬
estroika and glasnost may unleash forces
able to challenge the grip of atheism on
the ideology of the ruling party of the
Soviet Union. That, in any event, must be
the prayer of the religious communities”
(p. 331).

The appendices, an up-to-date bibliogra¬
phy, and a useful index help to make the
book a comprehensive source of informa¬
tion on the larger church and its mission
in the Soviet Union in the 1990s.

Hans Kasdorf is professor of World Mission
at Mennonite Brethren Biblical Seminary in
Fresno, California.

Mission Impossible: The Unreached Nosu
on China s Frontier. By Ralph Covell.
Pasadena, CA: Hope Publishing House,
1990, 309 pp., $10.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Dale Taylor

Ralph Covell’s Mission Impossible recounts
the story of the Conservative Baptist For¬
eign Mission Society work from 1946 to
1951 in southwest China. The Nosu are a
non-Chinese people, also known as Yi,
Yizu, and Lolo. The book is primarily “for
the record”; it is the group biography of
the mission team of which the Covells
were members. Readers who are inter¬
ested in broader issues concerning China
and mission would prefer Co veil’s 1986
title, Confucius, the Buddha, and Christ: A
History of the Gospel in Chinese.

Covell does not quite develop an argu¬
ment in this record; rather, he regularly
hints toward some themes, by now well
established in other interpretations, con¬
cerning the errors of many foreign mission
ventures in China, the innocent high¬
handedness and cultural misunderstanding

from which deportation and distance have
released us. The tone is factual and forgiv¬
ing: the mission was “impossible” not be¬
cause of wrong missionary methods, but
because of the raging of the nations, which
the mission programs should perhaps have
tried to understand.

When Ralph Covell sailed to China in
1946, with 669 other American missionar¬
ies, he thought that “the war” was over.
Howv r, China’s war, which had begun
in 1933, continued as civil war until the
Guomindang fled China and established a
government in Taiwan, late in 1949. Then
in June 1950, China and the United Na¬
tions began actions in Korea. By the time
American missionaries in China realized
that China was at war, the war was against
the United States. This, then, was the cause
of the gradual but strongly encouraged, if
not enforced, exodus of foreign missionar¬
ies from China in 1951.

The church in China survived without
missionaries, even during the persecutions
of 1966-76. The Covells report on the basis
of recent visits to their former home that
the Chinese churches in the cities of the
Jianchang Valley remain faithful, and that
the Nosu higher in the mountains are still
unreached.

Dale Taylor lives in Edmonton, Alberta,
Canada.

The Word Among Us: Contextualizing
Theology for Mission Today. Edited by
Dean S. Gilliland. Dallas, TX: Word Pub¬
lishing, 1989, 344 pp., $19.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Jerry Truex

Contextualization, as both concept and
mission strategy, is fraught with difficulty,
danger, and controversy. Yet for Christians
seeking to understand and appropriate the
eternal Word in every particular situation,
contextualization becomes the inevitable
path of discipleship and the necessary
means of evangelization. This conviction
dominates and unifies The Word Among
Us, a volume containing contributions from
twelve faculty of the School of World
Mission at Fuller Theological Seminary.
The book presents six chapters which ad¬
dress theoretical issues and eight which
aim at application.

Theoretically, the authors believe that
contextualization is biblical, supremely an-

45

chored by incarnational theology (Gilli¬
land). The Old Testament demonstrates
that, although transcending culture, God
chose to reveal himself through various
cultural mediums (Glasser). Similarly, the
New Testament utilizes diverse symbols
and local expressions relevant to each con¬
text, yet it presents a coherent message
(Gilliland). Thus, the “discontinuous
continuity’’ of the covenant displays a
model for contextualization today (Van
Engen). What is called for is both a “crit¬
ical contextualization,’’ where cultural
form and meaning are distinguished yet
critically related (Hiebert), and a “recep¬
tor-oriented’’ approach, where the deepest
human needs are met through word and
life (Kraft).

Application involves “transculturation”
of the message (Shaw), utilization of stra¬
tegically assessed methods of communica¬
tion (Sogaard), employment of leadership
models which fit receptor cultures (Clin¬
ton), and social transformation through
pertinent relational goals (Elliston). North
American (Wagner), Chinese (Che-Bin),
and Muslim (Woodberry) receptor cul¬
tures are specifically addressed as well as
the problem of Christian “nominality”
(Gibbs). Finally, an appendix compares
seven models of contextualization of which
the “critical model” is affirmed.

Although each of the authors displays
various degrees of enthusiasm and critical
assessment, the book has an apologetic
tone. A full chapter addressing the risks of
contextualization would have brought
greater balance. Nevertheless, the authors
may be commended for presenting com¬
plex issues for the nonspecialist and for
continually citing and drawing upon their
broad experiences to demonstrate that
God communicates with people where
they are. The book contains ample foot¬
notes, a full bibliography, and would be
suitable as a college text.

Jerry Truex is a third-year student at Men-
nonite Brethren Biblical Seminary in
Fresno, California.

Signs of the Spirit: How Cod Reshapes the
Church. By Howard A. Snyder. Grand
Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House,
1989, 336 pp., $14.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Walter Unger

With the current plethora of plans to
renew the church and evangelize the
world by the year 2000 comes a very
insightful book by Howard Snyder on how
God renews the church and rekindles
within it a sense of mission. God’s goal,
affirms Snyder, is not just to renew the
church, but to reconcile the world.

The Montanist, Pietist, Moravian, and
Methodist movements are analyzed as
models of church renewal. In a key chapter
entitled “Dynamics of Renewal Move¬
ments,” Snyder notes that the four move¬
ments were interwoven as part of a larger
renewal flowing through the 17th and 18th
centuries. All four made use of small cell
groups and all made provisions for some
practical expression of the priesthood of
believers. Education and educational insti¬
tutions played a key role in all four renewal
movements. The Scriptures were stressed
as being normative in the life and experi¬
ence of the believer, and the early church
was seen as the model of what church life
should be.

At numerous points the author compares
the four movements with the believers
church model, and also devotes a signifi¬
cant section to the Catholic Anabaptist
typology (pp. 54-61).

Each of these movements owed much of
its dynamic to the key leaders who shaped
them. Snyder concludes that “renewal
movements are neither direct, irresistible
acts of God nor the mere outworking of
inexorable sociological laws or constraints.
Much depends on human wisdom and
choice. Spener, Francke, Zinzendorf, and
Wesley all intended to see renewal come
to the church and worked self-consciously
to achieve it. The impact of the movements
they led was due in large measure to the
quality of the leadership they provided.”

The final three chapters of the book
present a model for renewal in our time,
various dimensions of renewal (ranging
from personal to missiological renewal),
and a final word on a renewal strategy for
the local church—all of which makes this
insightful reading for pastors, missionaries,

and lay leaders interested in renewal.

Walter Unger is president of Columbia Bible
College, Clearbrook, British Columbia.

New Creation Book for Muslims. By Phil
Goble and Salim Munayer. Pasadena, CA:
Mandate Press, 1989, 175 pp., $7.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Timothy Bergdahl

Phil Goble and Salim Munayer are cross-
cultural ministers who recognize limita¬
tions in traditional evangelical approaches
to Muslims. They propose a radically con¬
textualized gospel, offering opportunities
for Muslims to become “new creations” in
Christ without requiring behavior abhor¬
rent to family, community, or culture.

Quotations taken from Bible and Koran
have been shaped into an exposition of the
gospel and its implications for discipleship.
Specific suggestions are offered regarding
worship according to traditional Muslim
patterns.

Contextualization is a vital concept for
evangelism among Muslims, but I struggled
with some aspects of this particular ap¬
proach. Are Christians in a better position
to interpret the Koran than Muslims? I
don’t think so, and I doubt that the selec¬
tive paraphrasing of Koranic passages by
the authors would impress knowledgeable
Muslims.

Also, what is the value of being a “new
creation” Muslim? Can one be a “com¬
pleted Muslim,” in the sense that a Jewish
believer is said to be a “completed Jew”?
Can one claim to be a Muslim without
giving authority to all of the Koran, the
hadith, and the interpretation of the
ulama? I wonder whether God has pre¬
pared Islam to be used in the way the
authors intend.

Timothy Bergdahl, currently studying at
Fuller Theological Seminary, is employed by
Mennonite Brethren Missions/Services in
Hillsboro, Kansas.

46

A Guide to Christian Churches in the
Middle East. By Norman A. Horner.
Elkhart, IN: Mission Focus, 1989, 127 pp.,
$5.00 (pb)

Reviewed by Harry Heubner

This is one of the most delightful booklets
about the church in the Middle East I have
read. Having worked out of the MCC
(West Bank) office for two years (1981-
1983) and having visited many of the
church offices in the Middle East, I find
the vast statistical information and the
succinctness with which it is all presented
to be very helpful. During my time in the
Middle East I worked through A. J.
Arberry’s monumental two-volume work,
Religion in the Middle East. Horner’s guide
is a condensed version and updating of
Arberry’s study of Christianity.

Horner summarizes the theological/his¬
torical background as well as the sociolog¬
ical character of the following major
church groupings: Eastern (Chalcedonian)
Orthodox, Assyrian (“Nestorian”) Church
of the East, Oriental (non-Chalcedonian)
Orthodox churches, Eastern-rite Catholic
churches, Latin-rite Catholic Church, An¬
glican Church, and Protestant churches. In
each case he presents a sketch of the form
these churches take from Morocco in the
west to Muscat and Oman in the east, and
from Turkey in the north to Sudan and
Ethiopia in the south. He ends his study
with some insightful reflections on the
impact of the regional turmoil on the
churches. Included also are two appendi¬
ces detailing the Christian constituencies
in the regions, one according to churches
and the other according to countries.

This is a most valuable booklet. It is must
reading for every foreign Christian work¬
ing in this vast region. But it is not the kind
of book you can read once and put away.
It is a reference book which should be
consulted regularly.

Harry Huebner is professor of philosophy
and theology at Canadian Mennonite Bible
College in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.

Jesus Christ Our Lord: Christology from
a Disciple s Perspective. By C. Norman
Kraus. Scottdale, PA: Herald Press, 1987,
263 pp., $19.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Tim Geddert

According to Kraus the Bible, being an
Asian book, is understood most clearly and
interpreted most faithfully when examined
through Asian cultural/religious/philo-
sophical “glasses.” Western theologians
who aim to be faithful to the post-biblical
“orthodox creeds” inevitably distort its
message. They focus too heavily on rational
analyses of Christ’s being and on logical
analyses of his atoning work.

Kraus attempts to write from an Asian
(and yet Anabaptist) perspective. His
Christology focuses heavily on revelational
and relational aspects of Christ’s person
and work. We are saved through solidarity
with Christ, not by appropriating a substi¬
tutionary atonement.

Kraus’ approach is to critique and/or
bypass the early creeds, and challenge
many of the basic conclusions and/or as¬
sumptions of modern Western theology.

I feel the results are mixed. There are
some fresh insights on how certain New
Testament texts should be interpreted.
There is a helpful discussion on the impor¬
tance of viewing Christ’s person and work
in more personal than ontological terms.
There are valuable insights on how the
message of the cross addresses “shame”
cultures as opposed to 'guilt” cultures.

But in the process Kraus denies, reinter¬
prets, or minimizes some fundamental
Christian doctrines, calling them post-bib¬
lical distortions. Many theologians have
substantially denied the empirical reality
of Christ’s preexistence and virgin birth,
eliminated “Trinitarian” language in dis¬
cussing God, virtually ignored the Holy
Spirit, and attempted to present a theology
of atonement which eliminates “sub¬
stitution” categories. But few have jetti¬
soned and/or minimized these biblical
doctrines while claiming to be uncovering
the real intentions of the biblical writers,
as Kraus does.

It is essential that Western theologians
allow non-Western perspectives to shape
the way the gospel is interpreted and
presented. But this process need not re¬
quire as much reshaping of orthodox
Christian faith as Kraus suggests.

Tim Geddert is assistant professor of New
Testament at the Mennonite Brethren Bib¬
lical Seminary in Fresno, California.

Gods of Power: A Study of the Beliefs and
Practices of Animists. By Philip M. Steyne.
Houston, TX: Touch Publications, 1989,
272 pp, (pb)

Reviewed by Paul G. Hiebert

In this book, Philip Steyne examines an
important topic in contemporary mission
and in the West—the worldview, beliefs,
and practices of folk religions. Steyne
draws upon his experiences as a missionary
to South Africa and now as professor of
missions at Columbia Graduate School of
Bible and Missions to analyze these reli¬
gions phenomenologically and provide a
Christian response.

Steyne draws heavily upon Alan Tippett,
his mentor in doctoral studies, and pre¬
sents basically a taxonomic approach to the
subject. He examines the foundations of
animistic religions: their views of spirits
and mana, and their focus on power and
control. He then discusses specific beliefs
such as the animistic views of human na¬
ture, life force and ancestors, and specific
practices such as magic, witchcraft,
dreams, divination, and ordeals. He then
looks at types of ritual specialists. In all of
this, he points out how the people under¬
stand and see the world.

The insights are helpful. What is needed
is an examination of the basic human de¬
sires, needs, and questions which underlie
these beliefs and behaviors and lead peo¬
ple to believe and act in these ways. If we
do not look below specific religious expres¬
sions, we are in danger of reacting only to
surface manifestations, and of not provid¬
ing Christian answers to the deeper long¬
ings of people’s hearts.

Steyne provides a good initial Christian
response to animistic beliefs and practices.
Much more needs to be done along this
line, or Christianity will be seen only as a
superior magic or cargo religion providing
people with greater powers and blessings,
rather than as a new gospel that challenges
both the old animistic and the modern
secular worldviews. Steyne’s book is a good
introduction to a subject not only for mis¬
sionaries, but also for those working in the
post-modern West with its neopaganisms,
New Age, eastern cults, and focus on self
and power.

Paul G. Hiebert is professor in the School
for World Mission, Fuller Theological Sem¬
inary in Fresno, California.

47

Editorial

In 1987 in Mission Focus we began a series of articles on
the theme: “How my understanding of mission has devel¬
oped. ’ A dozen contributions, including Henry Schmidt s
in this issue, have appeared. Two other articles have also
contributed to this reflection—Robert Ramseyer’s in the
June 1990 issue, and Albert Buckwalter’s in December
1987. It seems worthwhile to summarize and underscore
some of the notes that have been sounded by people who
have been involved in mission in a variety of ways over a
long span of time on several continents.

The missionary vocation requires that the missionary be
able to live with a tension. The one pole consists of
commitment to Jesus Christ and unswerving loyalty to the
gospel. The other pole is comprised of commitment to the
people of another culture. Such commitment demands
identification with them, symbolized by their deepest
aspirations. Most of us have to learn how to live with this
tension. We set out on this cross-cultural—but not neces¬
sarily international—pilgrimage more clearly aware of one
pole or the other. Albert Buckwalter’s experience is a
particularly compelling example of transformation of a
missionary’s worldview as the prior condition for genuine
encounter.

What we sometimes overlook is that the experience of
this tension is not unique to the missionary as outsider.
Both Takio Tanase and Milka Rindzinski commented on
the ways their own worldviews were affected by encoun¬
ter with the missionary “outsider.’’ The result was to make
them less conformed to their culture at crucial points
precisely because they had embraced the “Christ’’ pole
and underwent a restructuring of their worldview.

In light of this, Frances Hiebert’s counsel that we not
concede too much to contextualization takes on added
cogency. An uninhibited emphasis on context can cause
us to lose sight of that which alone can transcend and
redeem culture.

A note that is sounded repeatedly is the extent to which
we find ourselves in the role of learner. We may have
gone to preach, teach, and heal, but we have repeatedly
heard the good news with fresh power and experienced
a new degree of wholeness through the faith of those to
whom we have gone. This calls forth a sense of gratitude,
as when Alle Hoekema tells of the way the Indonesian
churches became his tutor, teaching lessons that opened
up entirely new vistas of faith. Albert Buckwalter reported
how they “have been profoundly changed by the Indians’
response to the Scripture message.’’ Response begets
response; learning takes place as we join together in a
common pilgrimage to “the city of our God.’’

In addition to being willing to learn from others, we can
learn better teaching methods. In a particularly compel¬
ling passage Miriam Krantz tells how she was driven to
observe life-patterns and listen to the villagers she so

much wished to help. “I did this by visiting and observing
village families for one year until I could ask questions in
ways that the villagers could come up with possible
solutions themselves.’’ As a kind of footnote, she adds: “I
am reminded how often Jesus used questions to involve
people in their own healing and growth in understand¬
ing.”

Gerald Stucky sounded a note that has been a recurring
theme—the importance of the Bible. Delbert and Frieda
Erb continue to be concerned that the needs of lay people
be met through training programs suited to their level.
They call for priority attention to “base inductive Bible
teaching.” The meaning of the biblical message is deep¬
ened and broadened through common experience and
study. To see that message, as portrayed in the Bible,
become a transforming power in the lives of the barrio-
dwellers of Buenos Aires—or any other major metropo¬
lis—and the rural poor of Bolivia, is to find oneself caught
up in the drama of redemptive history. Jose Gallardo
conveys the urgency and compassion he has felt for
society’s cast-offs growing out of his own biblical and
theological studies and his experience of being an evan¬
gelist.

Leo Laurense and Arthur Climenhaga can view the
fundamental changes that have come in the relationship
between mission and church in the past generation as the
result of moving from one historical era to another. Glenn
and Lois Musselman have remained involved over a
period of more than thirty-five years with the church they
helped to found, by flexibly moving from one role to
another, first under mission direction and then under the
church’s decision. Takio Tanase applauds such
“Abrahamic” mobility as the essence of mission.

Not only is the missionary called to move from one
culture to another but to mediate between historical
periods of the Christian tradition. Robert Ramseyer re¬
flects on his attempts to draw inspiration and insight from
the sixteenth-century Anabaptist movement as he has
worked out his missionary vocation in Japan. Milka
Rindzinski testifies to the attraction of this vision of the
gospel in helping her decide to identify with the Menno-
nite Church in Uruguay where she has made a strong
contribution as a leader and trainer of others.

As Henry Schmidt puts it, his own development has
been “full of surprises.” This sentiment is shared by most
of those who have written of their pilgrimages. By defini¬
tion a pilgrimage involves responding to a call without
having a detailed itinerary in hand at the outset. It is the
one who calls who also provides the “surprises” along the
way. Most surprising of all is looking back on the Journey
and discovering that all the disparate parts have con¬
nected up and a pattern has emerged.

—Wilbert R. Shenk

POSTMASTER: Send Form 3579 to Box 370, Elkhart, IN 46515-0370

December 1990
Volume 18 Number 4

MISSION

FOCUS

The Missionary and Music

ALBERT W. D. FRIESEN

Music plays an important role in almost every cultural
setting in the world. Missionaries work alongside national
Christians in these settings, sharing the good news and
working to make that news understood and accepted by
persons within those cultures. An important step in help¬
ing the gospel become an indigenous part of the religious
experience is the use of music. Many missionaries have
insufficient musical and ethnomusicological training to be
helpful in the development of indigenous Christian music.
By assisting the indigenous culture to analyze or evaluate
its own musical culture, missionaries can encourage na¬
tional Christians to create their own type of biblical sacred
music for worship, fellowship, teaching, and evangelism.

The purpose of this article is, first, to make a chronolog¬
ical survey of the main resources available on the devel¬
opment of thought on indigenous hymnody and the actual
development of this hymnody. Second, it attempts to shed
light on the methodology of hymn writing so that mission¬
aries can encourage the creation of another culture’s
indigenous music for Christian worship.

Chronology of indigenous hymnody

Asian missionaries seemed to be aware of the need for
indigenous Christian music before missionaries in other
continents. An article published in the Encyclopedia of
Missions (Bliss 1891:151-55) listed hymnals of India,
Turkey, and Persia, in use from 1853 to 1889, which used
indigenous music.

H. A. Popley discussed India’s music in his excellent
article “The Musical Heritage of India’’ (Popley 1920:200-
213; 1921a:223-35). He deplored missionaries’ unwilling¬
ness to learn from India’s culture and to “Indianize”
Christianity. Popley emphasized his conviction that only
purely Indian music should be sung, and no attempts at a
hybrid of Indian and Western styles should be made, since
these broke almost every law of Indian music. His book,
The Music of India (1921b) provided an important step in
understanding and using Indian music in the church.

From the 1950s to today, much more has been written
about Christian expressions of worship in other cultures.
Rolla Foley’s book Song of the Arab (1953) included
Christian folk songs from the Holy Land as sung by Arabs.
Foley recognized that a lack of appreciation of the

Albert W. D. Friesen studied ethnomusicology at University of
Michigan and served with Mennonite Brethren Missions/Services
in Austria as church planter. He is currently an associate pastor
at Bridgeway Community Church in Swift Current, Saskatche¬
wan.

indigenous music so important to the Arabs had disas¬
trously limited the use of native music in the church.

A book similar to Popley’s is Emmons E. White’s Appre¬
ciating Indias Music (1957). Two chapters on music in
evangelism and music in the church updated what was
being done to utilize Indian music in Christianity. White
suggested some progressive and positive methods by
which church music could be improved.

A book still of relevance for missionaries today is Henry
Weman’s African Music and the Church in Africa (I960).
It was important, not in its generalizations about African
music, but in its suggestions to missionaries on how to use
African music in the church. Alan P. Merriam (1963:134-
37) stated in his review of the book that it would be
important to ethnomusicologists of the future as a basic
document for planned change in African music. Merriam
also suggested that studies should be done in specific areas
of Africa, since Weman’s generalizations were not very
accurate. In the intervening years, many good studies have
become available, describing not how to develop such
music, but rather how it actually happened in many
cultural, historic settings.

An important article by J. H. Kwabena Nketia entitled
“The Contribution of African Culture to Christian
Worship” (Nketia 1962) gives a brief but good analysis of
the characteristics of African languages and of music
which should be used in the church to make worship
relevant to the African.

The November-December 1962 issue of Practical An¬
thropology was devoted to the subject of “Music, Church,
and Ethnocentrism,” including an editorial by William
Smalley (1962:272-73). In the same issue, Mary Key, in
“Hymn Writing with Indigenous Tunes” (1962:257-62),
researched the meaning of music in different societies, its
cultural setting, and its function.

Another article on African music from this issue of
Practical Anthropology is “Indigenous Hymnody of Ivory
Coast” by Louis L. King (1962:268-70). King discussed
the spontaneous development, without appreciable mis¬
sionary stimulation, of local musical traditions for Christian
worship and witness. The fact that missionaries had little
to do with this development is significant.

An excellent in-depth study of Chinese music was
written by David Sheng (1964) in “A Study of the
Indigenous Elements in Chinese Christian Hymnody.”
Sheng researched the effect Chinese nationalism had on
the writing of hymns, from the Nestorian hymns of the
Tang Dynasty to the Hymns of Universal Praise published

49

in 1936. He noted that Chinese Christianity was influ¬
enced by the “Three Religions"—Confucianism, Taoism,
and Buddhism—and gave examples of these influences in
Chinese hymns which displayed a fusion of oriental and
occidental cultures. He came to the same conclusion many
had before him: a greater use of native tunes for Christian
praise, traditional or original, is necessary.

Gerhardus C. Oosthuizen’s study, The Theology of a
South African Messiah: An Analysis of the Hymnal of (( The
Church of the Nazarites” (1967) is a major step beyond
the study of style to the study of content. This implies an
acceptance of hymns as part of the organizational estab¬
lishment. The hymns are not mere experiments of cultural
expression in worship, but are the catechism of the
Nazarite movement.

Another helpful article from Practical Anthropology is
entitled “On Ethnic Music" written by Vida Chenoweth
and Darlene Bee (1968:205-12). The authors discuss some
important guidelines in approaching the oral musical
tradition of another culture and some dangers of introduc¬
ing Western hymns to these cultures, stating that indige¬
nous composers should be encouraged to write hymns. An
interesting concept of indigenous hymn writing comes
from New Guinea, where some nationals “dreamed" songs
which were quite acceptable in Christian worship.

Dorothy James, in her article “Toward an Ethnic
Hymnody" (1969:34-38), mentions that discerning indig¬
enous Christians are the best judges of what types of music
from their own culture could be used in ethnic hymnody.
This seems to have been the first recorded indication that
outsiders should not be the judges of what was musically
acceptable for worship.

Two other specific studies are Isaiah Mapoma s article
“The Use of Folk Music Among Some Bemba Church
Congregations in Zambia" (1971:72-88), and Lazarus
Ekwueme’s “African Music in Christian Liturgy: The Igbo
Experiment" (1973:12-33). The latter article, in addition
to stating some problems of relating a tonal language to
Western music, mentions some of the experiments taking
place during the special seasons of the Christian church,
and lists a number of musicians with examples of their
songs.

A significant development in the use of Christian indig¬
enous music was the employment of native Christians who
were musical experts to teach indigenous music to West¬
ern missionaries and their children. Robert Granner
(1973:6-11) relates that a school for missionary children
developed a program for occidental students to help them
gain a proper understanding of Indian music. The instruc¬
tor was an Indian Christian who had studied at the
Annamalai University in Chidambaram near Madras and
who was the first Christian in South India to obtain the
title of “Sangita Bhushanam," which means “an ornament
of music.” This reveals progress in efforts toward integrat¬
ing indigenous music and Christian truths and worship.

Descriptive articles and dissertations have been written
in recent years which describe the history of the hymn
development, the processes of hymn creation, and hymn
content and use. Included in these is James Krabilfs
dissertation, “The Hymnody of the Harrist Church Among
the Dida of South-Central Ivory Coast (1913-1949): An
Historico-Religious Study" (1989) and his published arti¬
cle “Dida Harrist Hymnody (1913-1990)" (1990:118-52).
The latter appears in the June 1990 Journal of Religion in
Africa along with three other articles on the development
of African hymnody. Another dissertation on African

music by Roberta King, not available for this article, has
been completed at the Fuller School of World Mission.

Methodology of hymn writing

A final word needs to be written about specific attempts
at establishing a methodology of writing hymns. The
article “How One Tribe Got Its Own Music" by Morgan
W. Jones, Jr. (1975:38-40), describes a three-stage process
by which the Trio Indians of Surinam developed their own
hymnody. In the first stage, missionaries wrote songs in
the indigenous language and set these lyrics to simple
Western tunes which the Trios adapted to fit their minor,
pentatonic scales. In the second stage, the Trios started
to write their own lyrics for these adapted tunes. And in

December 1990 Volume 18 Number 4

MISSION [7k

FOCUS W

49 The Missionary and Music
Albert W. D. Friesen

52 Evolving African Hymnody
Mary K. Oyer

56 William Wade Harris (1860-1929): African Evangelist
and "Ethnohymnologist"

James R. Krabill

59 Sing to the Lord a New Song
Malcolm Wenger

62 Experiencing Native American Music: Living with
Cheyenne and Crow Indians
David Graber

65 In review

67 Mission Focus Index

68 Editorial

EDITORIAL COUNCIL

Editor Wilbert R. Shenk

Review editor Wilbert R. Shenk

Other members Peter M. Hamm, Robert L. Ramseyer

Managing editor Betty Kelsey

MISSION FOCUS (ISSN 0164-4696) is published quarterly at 500
S. Main St., Elkhart, Indiana, by Mennonite Board of Missions.
Single copies available without charge. Send correspondence to
Box 370, Elkhart, IN 46515-0370. Second-class postage paid at
Elkhart, Indiana, and at additional mailing offices. Lithographed in
USA. Copyright 1990 by Mennonite Board of Missions.
POSTMASTER: Send address changes to MISSION FOCUS, Box
370, Elkhart, IN 46515-0370.

50

the third stage, the Trios composed both lyrics and music.

The second article is Vida Chenoweth’s “Spare Them
Western Music” (1984:30-35). Principles are presented
which will encourage all workers in a cross-cultural situation
to be catalysts for indigenous music. Interestingly, no en¬
couragement is given for artificial creation sessions:

Some of our number are trying to hurry this process by
means of workshops during which time nationals are expected

to produce Christian songs on demand_A workshop—in

the sense that a group meets in order to produce a repertoire
on demand—can be superficial both spiritually and musically.
... A couple of dangers inherent in the workshop method
have been observed: The participant quickly adjusts some
new text to a traditional melody (and is sometimes laughed
down because of the lingering connotations of the melody)
or, in some cases, the participant sweats with frustration and
embarrassment, unable to fulfill the request’’ (Chenoweth
1984 : 30 ).

The final attempt, “A Methodology in the Development
of Indigenous Hymnody” (1982:83-96), is my own, and is
excerpted from my thesis of the same title (1981). Both
outline a two-part, eight-step approach, providing guide¬
lines for the musical and nonmusical missionary who wants
to promote indigenous musical culture. Part I introduces
song types, instruments, singers and instrumentalists, and
technical characteristics. Part II consists of the psycholog¬
ical ramifications of the first part: song type evaluation,
instrumental evaluation, the use of existing melodies and
composition of new melodies, and testing. Finally, five
missiological principles to help focus the methodology are
presented:

1. An analysis of the indigenous music system is neces¬
sary in order to develop an intelligible, theological, and
cultural hymnody for the church.

2. Continuity of culture is vital to a smooth transition
and thus an indigenous development of Christianity.

3. The missionary’s role is one of catalyst/trainer/per-
former.

4. The discerning indigenous Christians are the best
judges and thus should be the final arbitrators of what is
acceptable in ethnic hymnody and what should be omitted.

5. Ultimately everything in every culture must be eval¬
uated in light of biblical principles and the ethnotheology
of the society.

In conclusion, this is an attempt to help people working
in cross-cultural church settings to reflect on the process
of music composing—most articles mentioned are avail¬
able from the author. We hope the least that will happen
as a result of this reflection is that no one will stand in the
way of such a growth of Christian music. At best, mission¬
aries will become catalysts in the development of beauti¬
ful, meaningful, and valuable music in the Christian
church around the world.

References cited

Bliss, Edwin Munsell, ed.

1891 “Music and Missions,” Encyclopedia of Missions, Vol. II, New
York: Funk and Wagnalls.

Chenoweth, Vida

1984 “Spare Them Western Music,” Evangelical Missions Quarterly
20 (January).

Chenoweth, Vida and Darlene Bee

1968 “On Ethnic Music,” Practical Anthropology 15 (September/Oc-
tober).

Ekwueme, Lazarus Nnanyelu

1973 “African Music in Christian Liturgy: The Igbo Experiment,”
African Music Society Journal 5.

Foley, Rolla

1953 Song of the Arab: The Religious Ceremonies, Shrines, and Folk
Music of the Holy Land Christian Arab, New York: Macmillan.

Friesen, Albert W. D.

1981 “A Methodology in the Development of Indigenous Hymnody,”
unpublished master’s thesis, Fresno: Mennonite Brethren Bib¬
lical Seminary.

1982 “A Methodology in the Development of Indigenous Hymnody,”
in Missiology: An International Review 10 (January).

Granner, Robert C.

1973 “The Sound of India’s Music in a Christian School,’ Journal of
Church Music 15 (July/August).

James, Dorothy

1969 “Toward an Ethnic Hymnody,” Practical Anthropology 16
(J anuary/F ebruary).

Jones, Morgan W., Jr.

1975 “How One Tribe Got Its Own Music,” Evangelical Missions
Quarterly 11 (January).

Key, Mary

1962 “Hymn Writing with Indigenous Tunes,” Practical Anthropol¬
ogy 9 (November/December).

King, Louis L.

1962 “Indigenous Hymnody of the Ivory Coast,” Practical Anthro¬
pology 9 (November/December).

Krabill, James R.

1989 “The Hymnody of the Harrist Church Among the Dida of
South-Central Ivory Coast (1913-1949): An Historico-Religious
Study,” unpublished dissertation, Great Britain: University of
Birmingham.

1990 “Dida Harrist Hymnody,” Journal of Religion in Africa 20
(June).

Mapoma, Isaac Mwesa

1971 “The Use of Folk Music Among Some Bemba Church Congre¬
gations in Zambia,” 1969 Yearbook of the International Folk
Music Council 1, Urbana: University of Illinois Press.

Merriam, Alan P.

1963 Review of “African Music and the Church in Africa” in
Ethnomusicology 7 (May).

Nketia, J. H. Kwabena

1962 “The Contribution of African Culture to Christian Worship,” in
Christianity in Africa As Seen by Africans, ed. by Ram Desai,
Denver: Alan Swallow.

Oosthuizen, Gerhardus C.

1967 The Theology of a South African Messiah: An Analysis of the
Hymnal of “The Church of the Nazarites, ” Leiden: E. J. Brill

Popley, Herbert A.

1920 “The Musical Heritage of India,” International Review of Mis¬
sions 9 (April), Part I.

1921a “The Musical Heritage of India,” International Review of
Missions 10 (April), Part II.

1921b The Music of India, London: Oxford University Press.

Sheng, David

1964 “A Study of the Indigenous Elements in Chinese Christian
Hymnody,” unpublished dissertation, University of Southern
California.

Smalley, William A.

1962 “Music, Church, and Ethnocentrism,” Practical Anthropology 9
(November/December).

Weman, Henry

1960 African Music and the Church in Africa, trans. by Eric J. Sharpe,
Studia Missionalia Upsaliensia 3, Uppsala: Svenska Institute for
Missionsforskning.

White, Emmons E.

1957 Appreciating India’s Music, The Christian Students’ Library,
Vol. XIV, ed. by J. R. Chandran, Madras: Christian Literature
Society for the Senate of Serampore.

51

Evolving African Hymnody

MARY K. OYER

The hymnody of a people reflects that group’s mode of
perceiving and responding to God’s person and acts in
history. Both the concepts of the text and the character
of the music reveal the particular people’s view of life—
their experience of time and space, of cosmic order, and
of relationships among human beings and the supernatural
world.

Congregations seldom find a need to articulate the role
of hymns in their worship. It is usually obvious. There is
for individuals and for the group an inner recognition of
the value of their tradition without rationalized explana¬
tions. When two diverse groups wish to meet, however,
the traditions of worship of the one—in use of language
and music—will not be immediately understandable to the
other. In order to communicate, they will need to learn
each other’s language and find some way to grasp the
other’s musical idiom.

Unfortunately, when missionaries went to Africa almost
two hundred years ago, they saw the need to study
language, but they carried their own hymns and musical
practices with them. They translated the texts into various
vernaculars, even though the shape of the Western musi¬
cal line violated the tone of the African language, and
accents often fell on unaccented syllables of text.

We have the record, through oral transmission, of a
remarkable exception to this general rule. Ntsikana, the
first Xhosa Christian in South Africa, composed a hymn
in his own idiom. The translation reads:

He is the Great God, Who is in heaven.

Thou art Thou, true Shield.

Thou are Thou, Stronghold of truth.

Thou art Thou, Thicket of truth.

Thou art Thou who dwellest in the highest

He who created life below, created life above.

That Creator who created, created heaven.

This Maker of the stars and the Pleiades.

A star flashed forth, it was telling us.

The Maker of the blind, does he not make them of a purpose?

The trumpet sounded. It has called us.

As for his chase, he hunts for souls.

He, who reconciles flocks that fight with each other.

He, the Leader, who has led us;

He is the Great Blanket; we do put it on.

Those hands of thine, they are wounded.

Those feet of thine, they are wounded.

Thy blood, why is it streaming?

Thy blood, it was shed for us.

This great price; are we worthy?

This home of thine; are we worthy?

(Lumko Song Book 1984, No.7)

The music consisted of one phrase, falling from its
highest note to its lowest at the end of the phrase (Ex. 1):
Example 1

-v- . fr

T -

1

1

...A... L # 1

!

... nil V _ r.

w . fj ... J. 1

_i

—j

-

f 1 J

B - (e-(e Wowi, h om-vut*

Mary Oyer was a member of the Goshen College faculty from
1945-87. She first visited East Africa in 1969 and taught at
Kenyatta University 1980-81 and 1985-86. Mary served as
executive secretary of the Mennonite Hymnal project 1962-69,
as secretary of the Hymnal Project Committee from 1982-89, and
was editor of the Hymnal Sampler published in 1989.

Its shape is far more African than Western. European
melodies tend toward an arch shape, with moderate rise
and fall. The continuous repetition of that one musical
phrase for the entire text was and still is an attractive form
in traditional music, but it may have been one reason why
Western missionaries neither understood nor valued the
hymn. It is hard to imagine what might have happened to
missions had Ntsikana’s poetic and musical gifts been
acknowledged and pursued, but Western hymns in trans¬
lation prevailed in mission churches for nearly one hun¬
dred and fifty years after his Great Hymn.

Early in the twentieth century, indigenous groups began
to break away from mission churches, often following the
call of a prophetic leader. The Harrists in Ivory Coast, for
example, the Kimbanguists of Zaire, and the Zionists in
Southern Africa all emerged in early decades of this
century. In Kenya, secessions of new groups began in 1914
and by 1972 over 150 distinct groups were reported in
the Kenya Churches Handbook (Kealy 1972:67). Many
had thousands of followers. These independent or indig¬
enous churches usually rejected the policies of the mission
churches as well as their westernized modes of worship.
They encouraged the use of traditional instruments,
though they tended to make drums of their own design,
size, and shape in order to distinguish their use in
Christian worship from specific roles in traditional society,
for which specific drums functioned.

Mission churches throughout the continent had good
opportunities to hear indigenous church singing. A num¬
ber of congregations, such as the Africa Israel Ninevah
Church of Kenya, often worshiped out of doors; services
began and ended with processions to a drum beat through
the village or town. Each denomination, however, seemed
to retain its own distinctive musical style, perhaps a bit
like North American denominations and even congrega¬
tions, which can be recognized by the type of hymns they
sing—perhaps German chorales, gospel songs, or prayer
and praise types.

A significant breakthrough came with the Second Vat¬
ican Council, 1963-65. African Catholics were mandated
to Africanize:

In certain parts of the world, especially in mission lands,
there are peoples who have their own musical traditions, and
these play a great part in their religious and social life. For
this reason due importance is to be attached to their music
and a suitable place is to be given to it ... adapting worship
to their genius (Mbiti 1972:xviii).

The impact on the musical style of East African Catho¬
lics could not be instantaneous, but within a decade
Masses and hymns in the Kiswahili language and in
African musical styles were spreading rapidly. At the same
time, the Lutherans and Anglicans in Tanzania were
experimenting with singing Christian texts to traditional
melodies.

It may be valuable to try to identify the elements of an
indigenous “African” style of music. Although each ver¬
nacular carries with it a unique music, certain distinguish¬
ing generalizations are possible.

1. Rhythm is basic to the musical texture. For some
groups, the drum is essential to an African sound. Father

52

Stefan Mbunga of Tanzania in a 1967 workshop presented
a paper on “The Right Appreciation of Tanzanian Indig¬
enous Music/’ urging the use of drums:

... you cannot prohibit African instrumental music or dancing
without disturbing the soul’s life. But you can give a new
outlook and content to drumming and dancing through
religious ideas and influences. The drum is not in itself a
“heathen” instrument, but because it is used in many pagan
contexts it had been regarded with suspicion ... In fact, it is
the rhythm of the drums which “crosses” the rhythm of the
song, and helps to create the interplay of rhythms which is
the foremost distinguishing mark of African music (Mbungu
1967:6).

For other people, a shaker or hand claps may have the
highest priority. In any case, the texture will be dense—
full of beats. There will be cross rhythms: two beats against
three occur frequently. For example, Jean Kidula re¬
corded the singing of SOLID ROCK (Example 2) among
Pentecostals and Quakers of Western Kenya. They altered
the rhythm to accommodate a faster tempo, then added
two claps to each triple grouping (Kidula 1986:117).

2. The emphasis on rhythm draws out the dance. North
Americans can sit very still while singing, using only the
head. An African would involve the whole person, often
allowing different parts of the body to pick up the varied
lines of rhythm. The whole body is involved in praise when
Africans use their own idioms. Languages reveal that
dance is inseparable from music. English has two words,
music and dance. Ngoma in Kiswahili could mean drum
or dance or the entire musical event. That language would
talk of music in isolation with a Western-derived word,
musiki.

3. The predominance of rhythm minimizes melody and
harmony. Western music emphasizes precision of pitch in
order to be able to combine notes in harmony. The
percussive sounds of rattles and shakers, which are always
present in African style, diffuse the sound and reduce
clarity of pitch. It may be more important for a melody to
follow the tone of the vernacular language than to settle
on pitches which can be identified by lines and spaces of
Western notation. Melodies often start high and fall
gradually, as in Ntsikana’s Great Hymn. They may cascade
downward slowly in a shape which Curt Sachs, one of the
earliest ethnomusicologists, claimed to be a common
gesture in ancient melodies around the world.

Harmonies, which function to create tension and reso¬
lution in Western hymns, usually have a different role in
African music, if they appear at all. A second voice may
be added to a Western hymn—even third and fourth
voices—but the harmonies will probably be altered to
adjust to African tastes. Opposite motion of parts, which
Westerners value, may turn into parallel gliding lines
which decorate a melody rather than providing clash and
tension. Here is a phrase of parallel lines in “My Jesus, I
Love Thee,” which I heard Brethren in Christ Zambians
sing in 1987 (Example 3):

Example 2

Example 3

Choirs learn their parts in lines, one at a time, rather
than by chords. The resulting sound is more linear than
vertical and harmonic. Key changes may be avoided by
eliminating accidentals.

4. The strophic form (the same music used for each
stanza) of a Western hymn is not a lively African form.
Much more common is a solo-response structure in rather
rapid interchange. The response is frequently repetitious
so that the group can learn it on one hearing and will have
no trouble responding as needed. The length of the
interchange is not programmed in advance. A given hymn
may be brief one day and considerably longer on the next,
depending on the leader’s imagination and the energy
with which the group responds. The solo-response form
signifies an important relationship. Nathan Corbitt discov¬
ered in his work with coastal Kenyans that “without a
leader, the song does not sing well.” The leader must be
able to “light the fire,” to “fill the heart” for the singers
(Corbitt 1985:156). Solo and response make an insepara¬
ble pair, creating the complete expression.

An equally important structural characteristic is the
cyclical repetition of a brief phrase (as in Ntsikana’s Great
Hymn). For my ears, there seems to be no strong forward
thrust or sense of growth leading to a climax in much
traditional music. Perhaps work songs influence this form.
A work song regulates the speed of activity, keeping it
uniform—neither too fast nor too slow. This evenness of
flow in time strikes the Westerner as a unique African
contribution to world music. It may symbolize an attitude
toward time which accepts, rather than attempts to over¬
come, the natural regularities: day and night, the changing
seasons, for example. Marwa Kisare, Mennonite Bishop in
western Tanzania, commented in his autobiography on the
cyclical effect of the music of the Luo drums played at
his father’s burial:

As Father’s body was lowered into the grave, the drums
began their rolling dirge—rising and falling like the ceaseless
rolling of waves onto the lakeshore, sighing and moaning,
representative of the ceaseless circle of life, birth, bloom,
infinity, death, round and round, a dirge articulating the
sorrow and despair deep in the souls of scores of people cut
adrift by Father’s passing (Kisare 1984:34).

5. What makes a “beautiful” sound is determined by the
ideals of a particular culture. The West over the centuries
has cut out the buzzing sounds which are vital to tradi¬
tional African music. An African university student told
me that there is no emotion without a buzz. The sound of
most instruments dies away rapidly. The sustained char¬
acter of the imported organs must have shocked and

teceMES:

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□

rr->,

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rz

~/L —i_

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m W #

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Mitape- is buitt on (css % X

r r

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53

baffled early African Christians, who were accustomed
instead to fast reiterated sounds. In addition, much music¬
making takes place out-of-doors. An enclosed space, so
valued by Westerners since the first opera house in 1637,
creates very different acoustical effects. Some Africans
have learned to like it, but for many of them it is an
acquired taste.

Within the past three decades the movement toward
these indigenous African values has increased. I suggest
four stages in that change of direction and will illustrate
each with an example from the Mennonite Church in
Eastern Africa.

1. The continued use of Western hymns in translation,
though altered to fit local tastes.

2. Exploring the use in hymns of the innovations
introduced by choirs.

3. Writing Christian texts for traditional tunes.

4. Composing new works in African styles.

The Mennonite Church in East Africa, like other mis¬
sion churches, has been enlarging its vision of a hymnody
in African style.

1. Western hymns in translation, especially in Kiswahili,
are valued. A hymnbook, Tenzi za Rohoni (Songs of the
Spirit) was published in 1968. The editors recommended
the use of the tunes in the books they had used for the
compilation: Church and Sunday School Hymnal , 1902;
Church Hymnal , 1927; Life Songs 1, 1916; Life Songs 2,
1938, and some British favorites, especially Sankey’s Sa¬
cred Songs and Solos. The translators often encountered
accent problems. For example, “How Sweet the Name of
Jesus Sounds” is in iambic rhythm (alternating light,
heavy). In translation it became trochaic (alternating
heavy, light), which would suggest that the tune ORTON-
VILLE would not be suitable (Example 4).

Example 4

Mom tld name, of Je -SCL5 sahiitts

J^-ruL ia - ke Ye ia -ynuu

But congregations seem to be able to cope with what
seems awkward to me. Perhaps traditional music of some
ethnic groups has more rhythmic flexibility than is present
in ORTONVILLE; accents may not be placed as strictly
at beginnings of measures. In any case, Mennonite
churches continue to use these translations. Congrega¬
tions do alter some musical details of their favorite hymns,
adapting the music to their own hearing and values. Half
steps and leading tones are not a part of the musical
vocabulary of some groups, so congregations will remove
them, substituting other notes, as in “Rock of Ages” at *
(Example 5).

Key changes may not appeal to them. The Nairobi
Mennonite Church adds a second line to NICAEA, leav¬
ing out the accidental which pulls to a new key in the
second phrase (Example 6).

2. Innovations in hymnody have often come through the
choirs. Bishop Kisare was supportive of choirs at a time
when choirs were not permitted in worship in the
missionaries’ home congregations. He wrote in his autobi¬
ography:

I love music. Choirs are my delight. I try always to promote
choirs. In our spiritual life conferences I give the young
people a large part of the program for their choirs. Sunday
morning worship is too dull if there is no choir to brighten
the service. We all need each other in the church, each
contributing his or her part according to the gifts and station
which each has (Kisare 1984:99).

I attended such a spiritual life conference at Shirati in
1972. At each of the sessions, all eighteen choirs who came
sang several numbers. Two choirs stand out especially in
my memory. The first was a group of mature Luo women
who sang in their vernacular rather than in Kiswahili. The
resulting music could not follow Western rhythms or
scales. The other choir of younger singers had the courage
to add percussion: a metal ring struck by metal and a nail
rubbed across the rings of a glass Fanta bottle. In both
cases, the spontaneous response of the congregation was
overwhelming, and high-pitched ululations broke out
among the women in appreciation and approval. At my
next visit to Tanzanian Mennonite churches in 1980,
choirs were using drums and shakers as a matter of course.

That gathering of choirs in 1972 was characterized
further by suggestions of dance. A number of them
entered down the aisle to the platform with a rhythmic
processional until one of the worship leaders requested
that they get to their special numbers with less expendi¬
ture of time. And the directors, with ornate batons, seemed
to be dancing in front of their choirs; the usual Western,
role of keeping the group together was not needed
because the singers listened to each other intently and stood
close enough to their neighbors to feel their breathing.

3. Last August I visited a Maasai Mennonite congrega¬
tion which met under a large fig tree near Ogwedhi,
Kenya. They sang from a book of texts published by the
Christian Missionary Fellowship, a group which values and
respects the culture of the people with whom they work.
Many of the songs in this hymnal, Maisisa Enkai , they
recorded on tape and made available to Maasai. The
Mennonites sang one in solo-response style, with this
refrain (Example 7).

One of the members, Joseph Sangale, told me that the
melody is an old Maasai song for the worship of special,

Example 5

Ifocjc of ft fee Ldvne hide mj-Stlf in Tife, Leftke u>a~fcrirtCic blrcd f fromtk^uzur-d^

Example 6

a iao -Uj t lord 6xx (iVi tire our ±on^$tdlriseic> tfee

54

Example 7

To [cl-SQT lo Iki-kou Li - no Y<£-su 01 - yw -t£ It Mfcaiov in-ib-ras.

(Translation: Thanks be to God, who gave us Jesus, the first-born, as a sacrifice, by his mercy.)

sacred trees or for unusually important people, such as the
healer. The word ho-la-le-yio , he said, could not be
translated; it is there like a “helping verb, to make the
song sit.’’

The tune has characteristics similar to those of Maasai
cattle songs; quick upward leaps at beginnings of phrases
and a slower descent downward to a magnet-like lowest
note. The fall of a fourth (as from doh to sol ) is a typical
Maasai cadence. In fact, it is quite characteristic of cattle
songs I have heard from other Kenyan groups.

The text fits Maasai experience, with its motif of sacrifice
and mention of sacred trees and the fly whisk (“holy tail”),
symbol of authority:

Example 8 continued

2 2

O God Creator gave his word. O Indhihiiyo dhegaha

Called us to obey him too. iyo atarta adin

He will then reward us. Asaga na siiye.

Let us praise him! Praise him! Have aan ammanno.

3 3

O Those who on the Lord believe; O Intii eraygiisa
He has made us each his child. addeedoo rumaysa

God the Father loves us. Wu u abaalgudaye.

Let us praise him! Praise him! Haye aan ammanno.

4

Tr. from Somali by Bertha Beachy O Intii aamtntoo dhan
Adapt, by the editors. 1978. inamu ka yeel e,

Haye aan ammanno.

EEFRAiW: Ehoo looraon holaleyio

Ashe naleng Enkai ai parmuain

To lasar lo lkikau lino Yesu

Oinoti le Nkai ai kiinug'iet Iyie intaras.

1. Ayooki endaruna sirua pasae iruko enajo.

I go in early morning. God hears me.

2. Intaiki ntomonok o ilewa olasar lo lkikau Yesu.

You give women and me a sacrifice of first-born: Jesus. ,

3. Inchoo enaisho o emukate raeyaKi erapuan lelo.

Those who give bread, I will give life.

4. Oong'arau to lng'ur le Yesu intaiki enashe Enkai.

I receive the mercy of Jesus and give God thanks.

5. Enkai nasai atasaiyia tokordu maa kisai.

God (to be worshipped) help those who pray to vou.

6. Tokordu oloiruko oleitu eiruk meibung'a osotua ng'ejuk.

Help those wich faith and without - so hold the good news.

7. Osotua lo inoti Yesu eitukuorieki ilasarri.

The peace of Jesus Christ is the one that washed away all other sacrifices

8. Neari te xnsalaba neitajeu pookin osuj.

He was killed on the cross and saves whoever follows.

9. Inyo tudurau inkonyek mirura olalashe ogol ong'u ening..

Stand up, open your eyes, you hard-hearted brother.

10. Inyo isoraa Ilhebrania ooiirau eraatua e tomon.

Stand, read Hebrews Chapter 12. •

11. Ajo eiting'o ilasarri le nkop liyieng'ie intare olmong’

All sacrifices have ended, where you offer sheep and cows.

12. Eiting'o entasim olchani orok meekure ekutu toki.

The idol of the tree doesn't value anything.

13. Osesen, osarge le Yesu, olasar lintaiki Enkai.

The body and blood of Jesus is the sacrifice you give to God.

14. Eitanapa Yesu ilenyena nemaiyian ile keper.

Jesus commanded his followers and blessed the heaven.

15. King'amunye olmumua sinyati olamal oiruko Enkai.

We receive with a holy tail the teas who believe in God.

4. Occasionally an original work in an indigenous style
emerges from Mennonites in eastern Africa. One which
the 1978 Mennonite World Conference Songbook intro¬
duced to North Americans is Haye aan ammanno (Klassen
1990:No.8) (Example 8).

Example 8

▼•// Let us praise him! Praise him!// ▼•// Haye aan ammanno.//

God the great Creator! Ilaahi na uumay

Let us praise him! praise him! Haye aan ammanno.

1 l

O God Creator made us all. O Wu na eegayayo

Ears and eyes and all four limbs. na ilaalivay e.

Over us he watches. ilahi na liuntay

Let us praise him! Praise him! Haye aan ammanno.

It was composed by Adam J. Farah, whose early years
were spent as a camel herder. An oral work like this will
have varying versions of pitch in notation. This version
corresponds closely to the way he sang it at Wichita in
1978 and the way the believers in Mogadishu sang it in
July 1986.

These four stages do not necessarily occur in chrono¬
logical order from one to four; they may be simultaneous.
The newer approaches are often additions to the contin¬
ued use of Western hymns in translation, and they repre¬
sent an enrichment of worship resources rather than a
replacement of the earlier. However, the last two stages
represent the more complete contextualization of musical
style, and they offer enriching possibilities for the world¬
wide church.

References cited

Corbitt, Nathan

1985 “The History and Development of Music in the Baptist
Churches on the Coast of Kenya: The Development of an
Indigenous Music, 1953-1984,” unpublished dissertation, Fort
Worth, TX: Southwestern Baptist Seminary.

55

Kealy, John P.

1972 “Catholic Progress with Traditional Music,” Kenya Churches
Handbook, edited by David B. Barrett, et. al., Kisumu: Evangel
Publishing House.

Kidula, Jean

1986 “The Effects of Syncretism and Adaptation on Christian Music
of the Logoli,” unpublished dissertation, Greenville, NC: East
Carolina University.

Kisare, Marwa

1984 Kisare, a Mennonite ofKiseru, Salunga, PA: Eastern Mennonite
Board of Missions and Charities.

Klassen, Doreen Helen

1990 International Songbook, 2nd ed., Carol Stream, IL: Mennonite

World Conference, Number 8.

Lumko Song Book

1984 Lumko Song Book, Lady Frere, Transkei: Lumko Music Depart¬
ment, Number 7.

Maisisa Enkai

1983 Maisisa Enkai, Nairobi: Christian Missionary Fellowship, Num¬
ber 136.

Mbiti, John S.

1972 “Preface,” Kenya Churches Handbook, edited by David B.
Barrett, et. al., Kisumu: Evangel Publishing House.

Mbungu, Stefan

1967 “The Right Appreciation of Indigenous Music,” workshop paper
for the Tanzania Conservatoire of Music, Dar es Salaam.

William Wade Harris (1860-1929):
African Evangelist and "Ethnohymnologist"'

JAMES R. KRABILL

Most Western missionaries down through the years have
believed that music was an important part of Christian
worship and should as such play a central role in the life
of the faith communities taking shape as a result of their
efforts. Unfortunately, many missionaries have worked
under the assumption that “heathen” people could pro¬
duce only “heathen” music—which must be discarded—
and that Western music being “Christian music” was the
perfect replacement to fill the newly-created musical
vacuum.

It was no doubt this belief which inspired Rev. W. R.
Stevenson to write with a considerable sense of achieve¬
ment already one century ago:

The fact is that the best hymns of Watts, Doddridge,
Cowper, Newton, Wesley, Heber, Lyte, Keble, Bonar, Miss
Steele, Miss Havergal and other English authors—the best
German hymns—the best hymns of American composition—
are now sung in China and South Africa, in Japan and Syria,
among the peoples of India, and in the isles of the Pacific
Ocean—indeed, in almost every place where Protestant
missionaries have uplifted the Gospel banner and gathered
Christian Churches (Stevenson 1892:759).

Four stages in the development of Africa's hymn
traditions

It is not surprising, given these views, that many of the
hymn traditions utilized by churches in Africa and else¬
where around the world today have passed, or are cur¬
rently passing, through a number of stages in their
development:

STAGE 1: Importation (where hymn tunes and texts both
originate with the missionary)

Here, “the best hymns of Watts, Doddridge, Wesley and
others” are simply taken over from the West and reproduced
as accurately as possible in African worship contexts. Hymns
at this stage may—with the passage of time—be “Africanized,”
which for the tunes means introducing the use of drums,
rattles and other locally-produced instruments, and for the

Mennonite Board of Missions (MBM) workers James and Jeanette
Krabill lived and worked among the Harrist people from 1978-88.
Following a year in England at the University of Birmingham,
where James completed a PhD. dissertation on the hymnody of
the Harrist Church, James and Jeanette are currently on a
three-year home assignment as mission educators for MBM.

texts, translating them from Western into locally-spoken
languages. Even these translated hymns, however—though
perhaps more fully understood than those remaining in a
“foreign” language—are really little more than “short-cuts,”
“temporary stop-gaps” and in any case “from the point of view
of their art, not the best” (Nketia 1962:119). For the problem
with hymns (translated or non-translated) in Stage 1 is that
they supplant the indigenous music system. And “music [being]
a vital part of a people s identity... cannot be replaced without
damage to the individual and to the society” (Chenoweth and
Bee 1968:206).

STAGE 2: Adaptation (where some part of the missionary’s
hymn—tune or text—is replaced or otherwise significantly
altered by an indigenous form)

What happens here is more than a simple “translation” of
Western tunes (with rattles) or texts (with language) into an
African idiom; it is rather a total substitution of some part of
the Western hymn (tune or text) by a tune or text of
indigenous composition. This “adaptation” can take place in
two ways: 1) where Western tunes are retained, but new,
locally-written texts replace the Western ones; 2 or 2) where
Western texts are retained and put to new, locally-composed
tunes.

STAGE 3: Imitation (where both the texts and tunes are
locally composed, but the tunes are an imitation of
Western melodies) 4

STAGE 4: Indigenous composition (where both tunes
and texts are locally produced)

This stage should be, according to ethnohymnologists, “the
goal” for churches in Africa for “when a people develops its
own hymns with both vernacular words and music, it is good
evidence that Christianity has truly taken root” (Chenoweth
and Bee 1968:210).

The majority of Africa’s churches, however, are still
nowhere near having reached this point. In the spring of
1987,1 was invited to attend a grandiose Sunday morning
worship service bringing together over a thousand mem¬
bers of the Western District of Ivory Coast’s Methodist
Church. Six choirs and one brass band performed a total
of 37 hymns throughout the course of the nearly three-
hour celebration. And of those 37 hymns, no less than 35
were of the “imported” (Stage 1) variety—27 of these
(including Handel’s “Hallelujah Chorus”) being further-

56

more reproduced in the French language, with the re¬
maining eight (including “Joy to the World”) translated
into local languages. There were no “adapted” hymns, so
far as I could tell, and only two fit the category of
“indigenous compositions.”

Africa’s independent churches have in many ways been
the leaders in creating a modern African Christian hym-
nology, yet even here it is surprising how many of these
movements have simply “taken over” with them the
hymnbooks of the parent mission churches from which
they departed. Some independents have even dramati¬
cally increased over the years the number of Western
hymns used in worship. The Church of the Lord (Aladura)
is apparently such a case if one examines the historical
development of the church’s hymnal: The 1932 edition
contained a “Western hymn” to “original hymn” ratio of
0 to 207; in the 1940 edition we find a ratio of 52 to 166;
and by the time the third edition appeared in 1958, the
tables had turned and the ratio had become 211 to 97
(Turner 1967:296).

There is, however, in both independent and mission-
founded churches a kind of musical revival taking place
in many parts of Africa today. This revival is producing an
enthusiastic wave of spontaneous creativity which Adrian
Hastings considered already in the late 1970s to be
perhaps “the single most encouraging thing that has
happened in African Christianity in this decade.” 6 “The
time has come,” said a Methodist pastor on Ivory Coast’s
national radio (March 18, 1984), “to make of our church
an African church, to lay aside the foreign system imposed
upon us by the missionaries, and to begin composing our
own African hymns accompanied by our own African
instruments!”

While Western ethnomusicologists and African pastors
and theologians are making urgent appeals for the cre¬
ation of more indigenous forms of worship throughout the
continent, there is at least one African Church who
remains little interested—if not slightly amused—by the
whole debate. This is the Harrist Church of southern Ivory
Coast—a church composed of second- and third-genera¬
tion descendants of the mass movement inspired by
Liberian-born Prophet William Wade Harris during the
first decades of this century.

William Wade Harris, the prophet-evangelist

When late in 1913 Prophet William Wade Harris left his
native Liberia to begin his now well-known evangelistic
campaign through southern Ivory Coast, he found himself
confronted with a population having had little if any
previous exposure to Christianity/ French Catholic mis¬
sionaries had for almost twenty years been working tire¬
lessly at establishing a credible and lasting presence in
the area, but had met with limited success. And the only
Protestant presence to speak of was to be found in small
and scattered groups of African English-speaking clerks
from Sierra Leone, the Gold Coast, Liberia, and Gambia,
who had come to Ivory Coast, not as missionaries, but as
agents of British trading companies doing business with
the coastal peoples.

The Prophet’s preaching, “fetish’-burning, and baptiz¬
ing ministry lasted a mere eighteen months until his
expulsion from the colony in January 1915. The impact of
that brief ministry, however, was most remarkable indeed,
resulting in an estimated 100,000-200,000 persons turning
from traditional religious beliefs and practices toward a
new reality structured around certain rudimentary tenets

of the Christian faith as prescribed by the Prophet:
worship of the “one, true God”; weekly gathering on the
seventh day for preaching, prayer, and singing; initial
exposure to God’s law in the Ten Commandments and to
the Lord’s Prayer; and the choosing of new “religious
specialists” (preachers and twelve apostles) responsible in
each village for watching over the general well-being of
the church.

Harris, the "ethnohymnologist"

In general, the Prophet Harris was a “man on the move,”
never lingering long in any one location. In some in¬
stances, villagers would travel long distances to see the
Prophet, receive baptism from his hand, and then return
home all in the same day.

One of the questions frequendy asked of Harris by new
converts during those brief encounters concerned the
type of music which they were expected to sing once they
arrived back home in their villages. “Teach us the songs
of heaven,” they pleaded with the Prophet, “so that we
can truly bring glory to God.”

Now it is important to understand something of Harris’
background in order to appreciate his response to the
thousands of new believers who crowded around him,
clinging almost desperately to every word of counsel he
could give them. Born of a Methodist mother in I860, 6
William Wade Harris had spent over thirty-five years—
nearly all of his pre-prophetic adult life (1873-1910)—at¬
tending and actively serving the “civilized” Methodist and
Episcopal churches of eastern Liberia. Quite understand¬
ably, the Western hymn traditions which filled the litur¬
gies of these churches had come to be the sacred music
dearly loved and cherished by Harris as well. When asked
in 1978 whether Harris had any favorite hymns, the
Prophet’s grandchildren recalled without hesitation, “Lo,
He Comes with Clouds Descending” (his “favorite” hymn,
which he sang repeatedly), “Guide Me, O Thou Great
Jehovah,” “Jesus, Lover of My Soul,” “How Firm a Foun¬
dation, Ye Saints of the Lord,” and “What a Friend We
Have in Jesus” (Shank 1980:597f, 1156f).

Yet faced with the crowd seeking his advice on this most
important matter, the Prophet refused easy answers. “I
have never been to heaven,” he wisely told them, “so I
cannot tell you what kind of music is sung in God’s royal
village. But know this,” he continued, “that God has no
personal, favorite songs. He hears all that we say in
whatever language. It is sufficient for us to compose hymns
of praise to him with our own music and in our own
language for him to understand.”

When asked further how exactly they were to proceed
in composing these new “songs of God,” the Prophet told
the people to begin by using the music and dance forms
with which they were already acquainted. For the Dida
people—one of the first and largest ethnic groups to feel
the impact of the Prophet’s ministry—this represented a
remarkable repertoire of at least thirty distinct classifica¬
tions of traditional musical genres, ranging from love
ballads and funeral dirges to songs composed for hunting,
rice planting, and rendering homage to wealthy commu¬
nity leaders. 9

Not all musical genres, however, were suitable, accord¬
ing to the Prophet, for use in praising God. The following
story from late 1913 describes how Harris helped the Dida
people in the coastal village of Lauzoua to identify what
kind of traditional music might best be used in hymn
composition.

57

The Prophet requested a calabash (rhythmical instrument)
from one of the women traveling with him and handed it to
Dogbontcho, a well-known local female musician-composer.
Dogbontcho in turn began singing for Harris a zlanje tune (a
classification of traditional “love songs” among the Dida).
When she had finished, Harris said, “That song does not honor
God! Sing another kind!”

This time Dogbontcho chose a dogblo tune (traditional
“praise songs” of political or religious patronage):

He who does not worship God will worship fetishes instead;

But the day that God tells him:

“Follow me and abandon your fetishes,”

That day he will have to do what God commands him.

The entire population of Lauzoua soon broke out in song
joining in behind their lead singer. The Prophet himself,
carried away by the rhythm of the music, climbed out of his
canoe and began dancing. And then a miracle happened, for
the paralytic Dogbontcho herself abandoned her cane and
began dancing with the Prophet, accompanied by the entire
population of Lauzoua now overcome with joy.

Following this miracle, the Prophet counseled the people
of Lauzoua to refrain henceforth from using their dogblo
music for “profane” purposes, but to dedicate it instead to
God, transforming it bit by bit and in such a way that it might
bring glory to God. And this is how the traditional dogblo
music of the Dida population of Lauzoua and Yocoboue
became the sacred music of the church which took shape
following the Prophet s coming to these parts. 1

Setting the new faith to music

Encouraged by these words of counsel and armed with
the confidence that they were themselves capable of
producing music acceptable to God, Dida composers set
to work, expressing with great enthusiasm their new-found
faith (Hymn DE25): 11

We too, we have at last found our Father.

We did not know that we were going to find our Father.

But we have found our Father;

Our Father is the King of Glory.

One group of old men from the Dida village of Makey
reported to me in 1984 that Harris, in his Lauzoua
statement, had given two very specific guidelines for the
composition of hymns: 1) that traditional “praise songs"
(literally, songs which “hurl forth" or “shout out the name
of someone") should be employed in the creation of new
songs, intended now to bring praise to God; and 2) that
much use should be made of “forgiveness language"—lan¬
guage ordinarily employed by an individual who “wishes
to reestablish with some other person a relationship which
has been broken or in some significant way greatly
marred." 1 It is remarkable how many of the earliest
Harrist hymns do in fact seem to express one or another
aspect of these two themes of “praise" and “forgiveness."

In the years which followed the Prophet s swift passage
through southern Ivory Coast, Dida Harrist composers
found other themes and developed additional music styles
as they learned to read the Scriptures and grew in
Christian understanding. My work with Dida leadership
in collecting and transcribing Harrist hymns brought to
light over 500 hymn texts spanning the 75-year period
from 1913 to 1988. Since my departure from Ivory Coast
two years ago, at least thirty new compositions have been
added to the list.

A model for today

Studies in recent years made by missionary anthropolo¬
gists and Christian ethnomusicologists have increasingly
insisted upon the following affirmations:

1) That “although God exists totally outside of culture, while
humans exist totally within culture, God chooses the cultural
milieu in which humans are immersed as the arena for his
interaction with people.” 13

2) That Western culture with its particular musical traditions
has been in the past and can be today “one such arena for
God’s interaction with people.” Should, however, Western
culture, Western languages, and Western music come to be
perceived as the only or even preferred arena for God’s
activity, then we are faced with a misconception which is “not
only culturally stultifying but also theological heresy” (Friesen
1981:ii-iii).

3) That God can inspire and speak through every culture,
every language and every music system (regardless of whether
persons outside of that culture have an aesthetic response to it).
To deny this is to deny the universality of God. 1

The Prophet Harris never claimed to be a theologian,
much less an ethnomusicologist or a cultural anthropolo¬
gist. But today s ethnohymnologists, trained in these dis¬
ciplines, could do worse if ever they were to choose him
as their “patron saint." “God has no personal, favorite
songs," he had told the Dida people at Lauzoua. “He hears
all that we say in whatever language; it is sufficient for us
to praise him in our own language for him to understand."

Notes

1. This article is based upon several sections from my disser¬
tation, The Hymnody of the Harrist Church Among the Dida of
South-central Ivory Coast (1913-1949): An Historico-Religious
Study , Ph.D. thesis, University of Birmingham (England), 2 vols.,
1989, 779 pp.

2. For examples here, see W. J. Wallace, “Hymns in Ethiopia,”
Practical Anthropology , 9 (November/December 1962), p. 271;
and Mary Key, “Hymn Writing with Indigenous Tunes,” Practi¬
cal Anthropology , 9 (November/December 1962), pp. 258-259.

3. Cf. Louis L. King, “Indigenous Hymnody in the Ivory
Coast,” Practical Anthropology, 9 (November/December 1962),
p. 269; lames M. Riccitelli, “Developing Non-Western Hym¬
nody,” Practical Anthropology, 9 (November/December 1962),
pp. 251-254; lohn F. Carrington, “African Music in Christian
Worship,” International Review of Mission, 37 (1948), p. 201.

4. This stage is suggested by Rev. Richard Rakotondraibe in
Donald Bobb’s “African Church Music” in Journey of Struggle,
Journey of Hope, ed. by fane Heaton, New York: Friendship
Press, 1983, p. 24.

5. See B. G. M. Sundkler, Bantu Prophets in South Africa,
London: Lutterworth Press, 1961 (1948, 1st ed.), p. 193, for the
Zulu Zionists; J. Akinyele Omoyajowo, Cherubim and Seraphim:
The History of the African Independent Church, New York: NOK
Publishers International, Ltd., 1982, p. 159, for the Cherubim
and Seraphim; and Harold W. Turner, African Independent
Church, Vol. II, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1967, p. 296, for the
Church of the Lord (Aladura).

6. Adrian Hastings, African Christianity, New York: Seabury
Press, 1976, p. 52; also, by the same author, A History of African
Christianity, 1950-1975 (African Studies Series, 26), Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1979, p. 235.

7. The richest resource for bibliographical materials on the
Prophet’s Ivory Coast ministry is David A. Shank, A Prophet of
Modern Times: The Thought of William Wade Harris, West
African Precursor of the Reign of Christ, Ph.D. thesis, University
of Aberdeen (Scotland), 3 vols., 1980, 1180 pp. Cf. in particular
Shank’s second chapter, more recently published as a separate

58

article in the Journal of Religion in Africa, XIV, 2 (1983), pp.
130-160, which provides an historiographical survey of some
180 items written on the subject over a sixty-five year period
(1914-1980s).

8. Harris’ date of birth has not been definitively established
though Shank s proposal of 1860, accepted here, seems most
convincing.

9. For a complete listing here, cf. Krabill, The Hymnody, p. 176.

10. For a fuller account of Harris’ advice to the Dida people
of Lauzoua, see my article, “Dida Harrist Hymnody (1913-
1990)” in Journal of Religion in Africa, XX, 2 (June 1990), pp.
119-120.

11. The code system used in collecting and classifying Dida
Harrist hymns is described in my paper, “Collecting and Pre¬
serving Hymns: An Aspect of Ministry with AICs,” presented at
the Kinshasa Pan-African Conference of Interdenominational
Mission Agencies Relating to African Independent Churches,
July 1-6, 1989. Conference papers are scheduled for publication
early next year by Mennonite Board of Missions, Elkhart,
Indiana.

12. Interview with old men in the Dida village of Makey (April
21, 1984).

13. A quote from Charles Kraft in Martin Wroe, “Ancient and
Modern: Church Music and the Culture Gap,” The Third Way
(August 1985), p. 22.

14. Cf. Vida Chenoweth, “Spare Them Western Music!”
Evangelical Missions Quarterly 20, 1 (January 1984), p. 30.

References Cited

Chenoweth, Vida and Darlene Bee

1968 “On Ethnic Music,” Practical Anthropology, 15 (September/Oc¬
tober).

Friesen, Albert W. D.

1981 “A Methodology in the Development of Indigenous Hymnody,”
unpublished thesis, Fresno, CA: Mennonite Brethren Biblical
Seminary.

Nketia, J. H. Kwabena

1962 “The Contribution of African Culture to Christian Worship,” in
Christianity in Africa as Seen by the Africans, ed. by Ram Desai,
Denver: Allan Swallow.

Shank, David A.

1980 A Prophet of Modem Times: The Thought of William Wade
Harris, West African Precursor of the Reign of Christ, Ph.D.
thesis, 3 volumes, Scotland: University of Aberdeen.

Stevenson, W. R.

1892 “Foreign Missions” in A Dictionary of Hymnology: Setting Forth
the Origin and History of Christian Hymns of All Ages and
Nations, John Julian (ed.), London: John Murray.

Turner, Harold W.

1967 African Independent Church, Vol. II, Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Sing to the Lord a New Song

MALCOLM WENGER

Sing to the Lord a new song,
for he has done marvelous things;

his right hand and his holy arm
have worked salvation for him.

The Lord has made his salvation known
and revealed his righteousness to the nations.

He has remembered his love and his faithfulness
to the house of Israel;

all the ends of the earth

have seen the salvation of our God. (Psalm 98:1-3)

The Hebrew singer had gained a new understanding of
God. A new song welled up from an overflowing heart.
We may know almost nothing about the melodies, the
rhythms, the intervals, or the musical structure of the song.
But we can be sure that the forms used were not unfamiliar
to those who heard the song. The singer may have combined
those musical elements in a new way, but what was most
important was a fresh realization of who God was and his
purposes and actions in the world and among his people.

Something similar has taken place as the Christian
gospel has become known to Native American peoples
such as the Comanche, Kiowa, Arapaho, Crow, and Chey¬
enne. New thoughts about God and his ways have resulted
in new songs using traditional musical forms and the
language of the people. Intertribal “camp meetings” in
Oklahoma became the setting where such indigenous
hymnody was shared with Christians from neighboring
tribes and often translated or the basic idea reworded in
the new language.

Malcolm Wenger lived among the Northern Cheyenne Indians in
Montana from 1944-66 and was a pioneer in recording Native
American hymns. As chair of Indian Ministries for General
Conference Mennonite Church, he helped to set up the Mennonite
Indian Leaders Council. Malcolm and his wife, Esther, have also
served as interim pastors in cross-cultural settings.

In many tribes the use of native musical forms was either
discouraged or Christians themselves decided not to use
their own forms. Hopi Christians expressed concern for
the Cheyenne usage of their native music in Christian
worship. Translations of Anglican and United Church
hymnals into Indian languages seem to dominate Christian
music in many native churches in Canada.

The Baptist missionaries who first came among the
Kiowa of Oklahoma encouraged new Christians to de¬
velop their own music, and as a result a rich tradition of
several hundred “church songs” developed. Mennonite
missionaries have been more ambiguous. Rodolphe Petter,
in spite of his unshakable conviction that the Word of God
must be communicated in the Cheyenne language, saw
red flags signaling syncretism when the same gospel was
expressed in indigenous musical forms. Lois Barrett quotes
from a letter Petter wrote to his wife after Harvey
Whiteshield from Oklahoma, his initial helper in language
work, visited the Montana Cheyenne churches in 1942 and
introduced Christian songs to Cheyenne tunes rather than
the German and English tunes which Petter used and loved.

Our Cheyenne songs, he [Whiteshield] simply discarded
and tried ... to introduce only his pet new Cheyenne songs,
which are not the spiritual food or expression which growing
Christians should have. They catch the Indians simply because
their tune is like that of the heathen and peyote people. Tell
our Cheyenne that the Sundance is a kind of spiritual,
sacrificial replica of Christ’s Passion, tell them that the Whites
killed Jesus, tell them all the Scripture passages which are a
pillow for them; sing their tunes etc., etc., do never mention
things that hurt them, then, of course they will like it. Is that
Christ’s Gospel? Has such a message made the Oklahoma
Indians morally better (1983:31)?

In spite of Petter s opposition, these indigenous songs
were sung at family gatherings, home prayer meetings,
wakes, funerals, and camp meetings. The hymns translated

59

by Petter from German and English were usually used in
church services. However, missionary J. B. Ediger—who
served at Clinton and Hammon, Oklahoma—developed a
deep appreciation for indigenous songs and about 1930
began to encourage their use in services.

Use and development of indigenous Christian songs was
slow in Montana. During my years of living with the
Northern Cheyenne, from 1944 to 1966, I was at first
unaware of such music. It was James and Julia Shoulder-
blade who introduced me to songs that they learned from
Oklahoma Christians. Not knowing of previous opposition,
I was excited to discover this indigenous hymnody and
began to record some of the songs on tape and try to learn
them.

It seemed to me that if the Christian faith were sung in
native forms it could be much more readily received and
understood. The Holy Spirit which God had promised to
his children would surely guide the Cheyenne Christians
in their choices of how to present the faith in song. Later
visits to Montana by John Heap of Birds and Homer Hart
enabled us to record additional songs. As I began to
understand the texts of the songs, they seemed to me
worthy of widespread use, and I began to think of making
taped copies available with the possible publication of a
new hymnbook that would include them.

In 1964, James Bixel, professor of music at Bluffton
College, took a summer leave of absence to study Christian
hymnody among the Cheyenne and the Hopi, with the
thought of encouraging the expression of Christian faith
in native forms of music and art. He recorded Southern
Cheyenne indigenous Christian songs, and encouraged
Hopi Christians to develop their own hymnody. He later
made his recordings available for a Cheyenne hymnbook
project.

In 1974, trained musician David Graber and his wife,
Bonnie, arrived in Busby, Montana. David became inter¬
ested in Cheyenne music. That fall he went to Oklahoma
to record more indigenous hymns available there.
Through David s work and with assistance on texts pro¬
vided by Wayne and Elena Leman, Wycliffe Bible Trans¬
lators assigned to the Northern Cheyenne in 1975, a
hymnbook of indigenous songs began to take shape. It was
published in 1982 as Tsese-Ma’heone-Nemeototse , Chey¬
enne Spiritual Songs by Faith and Life Press, Newton,
Kansas.

This hymnbook reflects the response of Indian people
to the story of the gospel as they heard it. The fact that
these songs were opposed by missionaries or not included
in the “official” songbook used in worship adds credibility
to the message they contain as a window on the past. Of
the 161 songs in the book, 90 of them have texts written
by Cheyenne people. A few are translations of songs from
other tribal languages or from English. These songs have
been kept alive in the hearts and minds of people, some
for perhaps as long as 80 years.

Of these 90 songs written by Cheyenne people, what
did Cheyenne Christians choose to sing about? How did
they describe the Christian gospel and changes it brings
about? What important Christian teachings did they in¬
clude or omit? Following are illustrations from the literal
English translations included in Cheyenne Spiritual Songs
(CCS) although in a few instances the word order is
slightly changed to be less awkward in English.

Some of these songs are quite old. One of them is
attributed to a man who died approximately the year that
I was born and is sung to an Arapaho melody:

Great Chief Jesus, Great Chief Jesus

I was happy when to your way I came.

Jesus with your mercy clothe me!

(Two Crows, CSS 24)

Songs were usually short but were repeated several
times. A leader would start a song without announcing it
and the groups would join in. Some of the very short ones
still carry much meaning:

A Christian says, “My Father loves me.”

He is right.

(Traditional Cheyenne giveaway song, CSS 84)

My heavenly Father, I love you.

I love you very much.

I love you.

(Maude Fightingbear, CSS 81)

One of the themes that runs through many of the songs
is joy, praise, and thanksgiving to God:

Let’s praise God that with his great power

He leads us daily! “Thank you,” we say to God.

When I was lost here on earth,

God was merciful to me too.

To God I prayed, he helped me, he saved me.

(Belle Wilson Rouse, CSS 9)

Thank you Jesus for leading us.

Your Godliness makes us rejoice every day.

Thank you, Jesus, for being merciful to us.

(Frances Goose, CSS 131)

Who is the God to whom the Cheyenne Christians sing?
When we share the gospel in a new culture, there is
sometimes anxiety to know what name to use for “God.”
The Hopi know of several divine beings, none which seem
appropriate to use as the name for the God revealed in
Jesus. Finally the English word “God” was borrowed.

The Cheyenne used the name Malfieo’o , or in the plural
Maheono, for the supernatural beings or forces or myster¬
ies to whom they prayed. Cheyenne Christians did not
hesitate to use Malfieo’o for “God.” But note how carefully
they defined who he is:

My God is the Most High.

He is the Truth and the Light.

He sits as chief in the highest heaven.

He has power and glory.

My God is truly the one to be thanked

Because he is merciful and lovingly kind.

My God is truly alive.

He is the one who gave us eternal life.

(Maude Fightingbear, CSS 8)

Other songs say that Maheo’o is the true God (CSS 12),
the one who made heaven and earth (CSS 11), the one
who sent his Son to save us (CSS 26), and our Father
above, the First One (CSS 95).

Who then is Jesus?

Jesus is God.

On earth His way is the only good way.

Follow it!

He will take you through where it is difficult.

He will have mercy on you.

(Cheyenne hymn, CSS 49)

Jesus is the one who calls us.

Come! Walk the way that he does!

It is the only true way.

(Old Colony camp meetings, CSS 50)

60

Jesus is the source of salvation (CSS 26), of cleansing
(CSS 38), of help (CSS 2), of guidance and daily care (CSS
24), of refuge (CSS 114), of a good life on earth (CSS 46),
and of a heavenly home (CSS 57). He is worthy of prayer
(CSS 19), praise (CSS 18), honor (CSS 16), and thanks¬
giving (CSS 109). The names “Jesus” and “God” are used
interchangeably in some songs (cf. CSS 122).

Salvation is described as deliverance from sin and being
made into a new person (CSS 74), being chosen (CSS 96),
being lost and then led (rather than found) (CSS 98),
being clothed with the Holy Spirit (CSS 76), or with Jesus
the Victor:

The Lord gave me His Son.

He clothed me with the Victor.

That’s why I am happy.

(Maude Fightingbear, CSS 30)

But by far the most frequent picture of the Christian
life is that of the journey, of walking on Jesus’ way. At least
21 songs include this imagery:

Jesus’ way alone is good.

It alone is true. Accept it!

Rejoice because of it every day!

The Holy Spirit will lead you.

(Cheyenne Hymn CSS 79)

God, I too have taken your way.

Be merciful to me!

Whenever I sin, renew my mind!

Stand with me!

(Cheyenne Hymn CSS 68)

A popular song by John Heap of Birds has become
known as the “Baptismal Song” from its frequent use in
that setting:

Jesus, I have come to your way. Welcome me!

I am walking, I am ready.

Thank you, I tell you, that you will save me.

(CSS 62)

The one becoming a Christian is expected to be actively
walking with Jesus. The Christian life is faith in action.
The word “church” does not occur in these songs. Yet it
is clear that the Christian life involved the coming together
of a people in response to an invitation from Jesus. As they
approach God together, they rejoice and praise him.

Jesus, we rejoice to gather together with you.

You have called us. “I am the way,’’ you say to us.

Lead us well in your way!

(John Heap of Birds, CSS 1)

Let us approach God! Let us approach God!

He is the one who is the true God.

Let us rejoice! Let us praise God’s name!

(Bell Wilson Rouse, CSS 5)

Our friend Jesus, our friend Jesus,

He invites us, he invites us.

Come together! Come together!

Jesus calls us, come!

(Attr. to Mrs. Bear Bow, CSS 3)

Some thirty songs offer guidance and resources for
living the Christian life.

Discipleship is encouraged:

Jesus is the one who calls us.

Come! Walk the way he does!

It is the only true way.

(Old Colony Camp meetings, CSS 50)

In hardship, we ask God not to be exempted, but to go
with us:

God, look upon us! Be merciful to us!

We carry your name.

Bring us through, even though it is difficult!

By your divine power we are victors.

Be merciful to us!

(Frances Goose, CSS 124)

We ask for help in temptation and sin:

Lord have mercy on me! Help me!

I’m walking in dangerous places.

(Maude Fightingbear, CSS 130)

Jesus, we go to you for refuge

We are asking you with joyfulness

Give us clear thinking in our lives.

(John Heap of Birds, CSS 114)

Jesus, I am depending on you.

I’m slow at learning your way,

The good way which you gave us.

Yet, I ask, be merciful to me.

I just wait for you, Jesus.

(John Heap of Birds, CSS 136)

A song of prayer says:

I thought about him in the morning,

Since today, Jesus’ day, the good day, has come.

I prayed to him this morning.

It made me happy to think about Jesus.

(Harry Starr, CSS 19)

I found no songs about service to others, about offering
a cup of cold water in Jesus’ name. One possible reference
to prophetic justice is found in CSS 54 attributed to Belle
Rouse, “The high place will be put down.”

There are many songs in which the evangelistic invita¬
tion is extended to ask others to consider the Jesus road.
For example:

Take the Savior as your friend!

His way is the only good way.

His story is the only true way.

All over the world it has spread.

(Newakis Lamebull, CSS 55)

Newakis worked as an informant at sessions of the
Summer Institute of Linguistics. Her students scattered
all over the world and many wrote to tell her of their work
of Bible translation. From her I first heard the Cheyenne
language.

Singing was a culturally appropriate way among the
Cheyenne to honor someone. The announcer called for a
song in recognition of someone. The honored one danced
in formal procession around the circle. In about 1910,
Watan, a Cheyenne-speaking Arapaho, adapted this tra¬
ditional honor song for use in honoring Jesus.

Sing an honor song to Jesus!

Sing an honor song to Jesus!

Now take his word!

Now follow his way!

Praise Jesus’ name!

Praise Jesus’ name!

(Old Colony, CSS 16)

Sometimes the Cheyenne appointed children to honor¬
ary positions of responsibility in the community. Someone
else did the work but the child might be honored as the
holder of the position by the giving of a valuable gift to a

61

stranger or visitor. In this song, God honors Jesus by
seeking a stranger to whom God can give eternal life. To
the traditional giveaway song (verse 1), Josephine
Glenmore has added two verses using this custom to
explain the Christian gospel. "Stranger,” literally "trav¬
eler,” by spiritual application can mean anyone not yet on
God’s road and part of God s family. The handshake
acknowledges the gift.

A stranger, I’m looking for one.

For the sake of my child I’m looking for one.

A stranger, I am looking for one.

I am going to give away to him eternal life.

Stranger, I am looking for you.

I am going to give away to you, come shake my hand.

(CSS 58)

And finally a few songs about heaven and the second
coming of Jesus.

Perhaps the time is near

When the Lord Jesus will come back again.

Get ready! Watch, and pray all the time!

(Maude Fightingbear, CSS 42)

David Graber explains in a note to the following song
that Stacy Wolfchief, also known as Afraid of Beavers, was
a Cheyenne who married into the Kiowa tribe and learned
the Kiowa language. He originally made this as a Kiowa
hymn, and Frances Goose, his niece, translated it into
Cheyenne. It has often brought comfort and hope in time
of grief.

Jesus, open the door for us

When we also come to the kingdom, the beautiful land!

Jesus, welcome us! We will arrive rejoicing

At the eternal kingdom, at the eternal kingdom.

(CSS 148)

Perhaps the best known of the songs about heaven is
called "Howling Water s Song.” Others think it was Alfrich

Heap of Birds who—died in 1922—who first sang it. These
songs are looked upon not as personal creations but as
gifts from God.

It is the most beautiful place above
Where Jesus has gone to prepare for us.

Let’s praise him every day
Because he prepared it well for us.

(CSS 145)

Finally a song that leaves us with a searching question is
based on 1 Peter 3:1-18:

Someday all heaven and earth will be destroyed.

And when Jesus comes, we will all see him.

And how shall we answer him?

(Soar Woman, CSS 39)

How shall we answer him?

With the exception of songs about service and justice
these indigenous Cheyenne spiritual songs give a broad
coverage of Christian teaching. The omissions may have
been on the part of their teachers.

Earlier this year when the Cheyenne church at Seiling,
Oklahoma, and the Arapaho church at Canton, Oklahoma,
ordained Newton and Amelia Old Crow, Christians wear¬
ing traditional dress sang praise to God using traditional
musical forms in the Arapaho, Cheyenne, Crow, and
Kiowa languages. Perhaps the "musical barrier,” as well as
the language barrier, is not as high as it once was
(Chenoweth 1968).

References cited

Barrett, Lois

1983 The Vision and the Reality , Newton, KS: Faith and Life Press.
Chenoweth, Vida and Darlene Bee
1968 “On Ethnic Music,’’ Practical Anthropology, (September/Octo¬
ber) 205-212.

Graber, David, ed.

1983 Tsese-Ma’heone-Nemeototse, Cheyenne Spiritual Songs, Newton,
KS: Faith and Life Press.

Experiencing Native American Music:

Living with Cheyenne and Crow Indians

DAVID GRABER

Experiences

In August 1973, I received a call from Ted Risingsun, a
school board member at Busby School, to interview for a
music teaching job on the Northern Cheyenne reserva¬
tion. In less than two weeks, I moved with my family to
Busby, Montana. We arrived in time for the Busby pow¬
wow. The community gathered for a "family reunion” with
singing and dancing every night. My children and I heard
and felt the drum beat from our home a half mile away.
As a musician, I was compelled to get closer. I took a tape
recorder and recorded comments: "The songs all sound
alike— They sing out of tune— The meter of the song
is out of sync with the beat of the drum.... There must
be lots of improvisation or carelessness in singing.”

David Graber teaches music at the high school in Lodge Grass,
Montana, where 90 percent of the students are Crow Indians. He
and his family live in Hardin, Montana.

I tried to be respectful, but couldn’t relate well to what
I was hearing.

Months later an audio album arrived with Native Amer¬
ican music arranged for classroom music teaching. I taught
my students some Eskimo and Creek songs, and soon
grandmothers were asking me, "Where did you get those
Indian songs? Why don’t you teach them our Cheyenne
songs?” I began visiting elders who were glad to sing
Cheyenne songs appropriate for children to learn in
school. I started a small collection of recordings and began
writing down some of the songs. I was invited to sing with
a native drum group at powwows and, with some patient
coaching, I began to unlearn tempered scale interval
tuning, attachment of metric parameters like a "down
beat” to the drum accompaniment. Basically what I
thought was accident or improvisation was in reality
essential to the songs—all this, of course, from musicians
who had little or no formal training in European music.

62

Within the first months of our arrival, we attended a
gathering of the Mennonite churches on the reservation,
and I heard an elder gentleman sing a Christian song
unlike any I had ever heard. James Shoulderblade, the
singer, introduced me to the tradition of Cheyenne indig¬
enous hymns; eventually James became an important
contributor to the Cheyenne hymnbook.

The following year I learned to know Malcolm Wenger,
one of the few missionaries to Native American people
who valued and encouraged indigenous hymnody. He
asked me to come to a conference of Mennonite Indian
church leaders (MILC) in Oklahoma with a tape recorder.
He and James Shoulderblade knew that the tradition of
indigenous hymnody was being lost. He shared with me
his dream of a hymnbook that would contain indigenous
hymns alongside those translated by Rodolphe Petter, a
Mennonite missionary who opposed indigenous hymnody
among the Cheyenne. I went to Oklahoma, where the
response to the project was generous. Elders encouraged
the work and contributed songs.

In 1978, my family and I moved to Kansas. There work
with Cheyenne in Oklahoma could proceed more easily.
I made several trips to Oklahoma, meeting with people
who contributed songs and historical information about
the songs. Lawrence Hart, a Cheyenne Mennonite min¬
ister and traditional chief, and his wife, Betty, hosted my
wife and me in Clinton. They also coordinated meetings
to work on the hymns. Nine years later, in 1982, the
Cheyenne hymnbook, Tsese-MaTieone-Nemeototse , was
published, containing 160 hymns. At first it was going to
be just a photocopied, loose-leaf notebook of songs. But
with the urging of Ted Risingsun, the Northern Cheyenne
Mennonite Leaders Council representative, and others,
the committee decided to publish it with a hardback, so
it would have the solid look and feel of most other
hymnbooks.

Just this summer I completed the audio masters for a
four-cassette album with recordings of all the hymns.
Nearly all the indigenous hymns in the album are copies
of the original recordings from which I wrote the indige¬
nous hymns in the hymnbook. These are available from:
The Northern Cheyenne Mennonite Churches, Box 72,
Busby, MT 59016.

The hymnbook was well received in Montana, where
Rodolphe Petter had so long opposed the indigenous
hymns. The Cheyenne in Montana had learned and still
love Petter’s translated hymns, but these do not speak like
the hymns that use music familiar to the Cheyenne and
other Plains Indian people.

Writing down this oral tradition presented those of us
involved in the project with complex issues, some of them
hard to resolve. There was initially some opposition and
even hostility from certain Native American traditionalists.
In Oklahoma, the tradition remains oral, but there is
growing interest in using the hymnbook. Lyle Redbird was
commissioned by Mrs. Belle Wilson Rouse before she died
nearly twenty years ago to continue the tradition of
indigenous oral hymns she had so patiently taught along
with her preaching and healing ministry. At first it ap¬
peared that Lyle s mission would be in conflict with the
written hymns. Recently Lyle has been contributing to
the hymnbook work and using the hymnbook in his own
ministry.

In 1984, I was invited by some Crow Indian members
of a Bible translation group to come back to Montana to
work on developing the first Crow Indian hymnbook.

Although the Crow people have a long tradition of oral
hymnody, they have not had a hymnbook in their own
language. We moved to Hardin, Montana, where I am
continuing to teach music in a local public high school on
the Crow reservation.

My work with the Crow hymnbook project began with
recording and archiving the recordings, and continues
with writing the hymns for a hymnbook. A decision was
made early this summer by the committee to separate the
traditional hymns from the translated hymns, and to
publish the first volume this summer or fall. As of October,
the pages of the first volume of 48 hymns have been
printed out with a laser printer, and when the cover and
a historical narrative are completed, this will be published.
I have also just completed audio masters for a cassette
album of the songs in this hymnbook. The committee is
looking for resources to produce this album so it is
available along with the hymnbook.

Observations

Most, if not all, American tribal groups that accepted
Christianity initially responded with songs at home in their
own culture. But the grammar of Native American music,
with its glottals, pitch bends, and complex rhythmic
structure and drum beat with no meter, was heard by
Europeans to lack essential elements for hymn tunes. It
was considered primitive, if not pagan. 1 Few missionaries
gave their Native American converts consent to exercise
creative musical traditions in a Christian way. Without
those few there would be almost no authentic indigenous
Native American hymnody. Apparently a few Baptist
missionaries were the first to give free rein to Kiowa
people of Oklahoma to sing and use their own music and
texts for hymns. Jacob B. Ediger in Oklahoma and Mal¬
colm Wenger in Montana were among those Mennonites
who encouraged use of such songs among Cheyenne and
Arapaho in worship services.

But it has taken a long time to give them the same status
as European hymns. Except for a few indigenous hymns
in South Dakota among the Ogallala, I know of no other
indigenous hymnody outside of those tribes exposed to
the tradition in Oklahoma that arose with the consent of
missionaries.

I think most tribal Christians, with a strong tradition of
song-making, tried to make their own Christian songs
modeled on the European pattern. They usually encoun¬
tered a credibility problem. These songs were called
“attempts to imitate” Christian hymns. 2

In spite of this, indigenous hymnody flourished in
Oklahoma. Tent camp meetings were from early in this
century an important setting for encouraging Christian
evangelism as well as learning and sharing hymns. To this
day, when camp meetings are held, representatives of
different tribes are called on to share songs in their own
tradition and language. These songs have been learned
and translated for other tribes. Cheyenne and Crow
singers often acknowledged to me that their hymn was
originally a Kiowa hymn. There was also sharing of hymns
among other tribes, especially the Comanche, Arapaho,
and Sioux. To my knowledge, Native American indigenous
hymnody was effectively throttled and disappeared—if it
existed—among nearly all North American tribes except
for these few Plains tribes.

Joe Medicine Crow, tribal historian and anthropologist
who serves on the Crow Hymnbook Committee, estimates
that there are over 200 indigenous Crow hymns. Many of

63

these are personal songs, and may be shared and sung by
an individual in public testimony. Public singing may or
may not lead to group singing of the song. Certainly, many
Crow hymns remain a private expression of prayer and
praise to God.

Since 1973, I have acquired respect and appreciation
for the tradition of hymnody God has given Native Amer¬
ican people. I am aware that what I have learned is a small
part of what has been and what could still be, were there
less cultural arrogance among those of the dominant
European culture.

Music is only one of many cultural items still easily
misunderstood and misused by persons of the dominant
culture. In all these issues, careful listening and waiting
for guidance to emerge from the people themselves is best.
Native American Christians in this country have widely
varying views regarding their own traditions and culture.
Very few answers of what music, dance, or ceremonies are
appropriate for a Christian can be applied to other Chris¬
tians. St. Paul’s refusal to compromise on the “high calling
of God in Christ Jesus” is mistakenly applied to a variety
of musical and cultural matters by different Native Amer¬
ican people, depending on their own tribal or missionary

tradition. This variety and the strength of local opinions
is not unlike that of the Mennonite tribes.

A temptation of some is to “turn back the cultural clock”
and try to teach Indian culture to Indian Christians. While
the intentions are better than the mission efforts fifty years
ago, the results are the same because the cultural expres¬
sions are still manipulated and not free. We must each
trust the other’s ability to hear God speak in the appro¬
priate media. All we can do is share, through our own gifts,
our joy in discovering God who is alive and present to us
in all our affairs.

It has been heartening to me to see some increased
appreciation for this beautiful, God-sent tradition of music
that has come to Native American people. I have gained
much in being part of this reawakening.

Notes

1. See Rodolphe Petter’s letter to the Mennonite General
Conference around 1940 in the archives at Bethel College,
Newton, Kansas.

2. Robert Lowie was commenting on the wax cylinder record¬
ing he made of Crow music in the 1930s, archived in the Lowie
Museum, Berkeley, California.

64

In Review

Cross and Sword: An Eyewitness History
of Christianity in Latin America. Edited
by H. McKennie Goodpasture. Maryknoll,
NY: Orbis Books, 1989, 314 pp., $12.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Glendon Klaassen

The uniqueness of this book is described
by the subtitle. It is not an interpretive
study, but a primary source of original
documents telling the story of five hun¬
dred years of Christian church history in
Latin America. Editor Goodpasture is pro¬
fessor of church history and mission studies
at Union Theological Seminary in Rich¬
mond, Virginia.

The timing of this book is most appropri¬
ate as Latin Ajnerica commemorates in
1992 the five-hundred-year anniversary
since the “discovery” of the Americas by
Europeans, who also brought Christianity
to the region. I was introduced to this
volume by Samuel Escobar, a Peruvian
friend teaching at Eastern Baptist Semi¬
nary. He values this book, and I concur
with his recommendation. This volume is
for all involved in Latin America who wish
to understand the reasons behind current
developments.

This is a fascinating and illuminating
collection of documents that give perspec¬
tive to the general, historical developments
as well as occasional specific local and
regional histories as narrated by 118 wit¬
nesses. Beginning with a journal entry from
Spain by Christopher Columbus in 1492
and spanning the five centuries in an
interview with a Lutheran missionary in
Peru in 1983, these pages offer a great
variety of reports and stories. Some are told
with deep feeling that illicits profound
reflections from the reader. These are
witnesses of coercion and exploitation, and
also of care and concern; of minority con¬
trol over majority; of horrors and ecstacies;
but all deal with the lives of people.

Goodpasture divides this book into three
major periods of development whose
boundaries have political and ecclesiastical
significance: 1) the years 1492-1808 rep¬
resent the colonial era and Roman Catholic
dominance; 2) 1808-1962 represent reli¬
gious diversity with a diminishing role of
Roman Catholicism; and 3) 1960-1985
represent liberation struggles. Each period
is subdivided into shorter segments. For
each division as well as for each of the
documents, Goodpasture gives a helpful
introduction identifying source, date, and
context.

It is difficult to be critical with a book
that presents primary source materials with

little interpretation or evaluation. For all
who wish to understand the Latin America
situation, especially the religious scene of
both Roman Catholic and Protestant faith,
this book is essential. The rapid changes
taking place today in Latin America must
always be informed by such contextualized
understandings. As the celebrations of the
500 years begin, it is appropriate to reflect
on the “multitude of people ... consumed
... spreading destruction over the whole
hemisphere ...” as B. de las Casas recorded
in 1540 (p. 11).

Would not repentance and relinquishing
control be even more appropriate than
celebration for what happened and for
what continues to shape the social, eco¬
nomic, political, and spiritual legacy of
Latin America?

Glendon Klaassen is employed by General
Conference Mennonite Commission on
Overseas Mission in Newton, Kansas.

Liberating News: A Theology of Contex¬
tual Evangelization. By Orlando E. Costas.
Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans,
1989, 189 pp., $12.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Erwin Rempel

The manuscript for this book was com¬
pleted in 1987 just before the untimely
death of its author, Orlando E. Costas, at
age 45. He authored several books includ¬
ing The Church and Its Mission (Tyndale,
1974), The Integrity of Mission (Harper &
Row, 1979), and Christ Outside the Gate
(Orbis, 1982).

“The practice of evangelization has been
the passion of my ministerial career...” are
the words Orlando s wife, Rose L.
Feliciano Costas, found scribbled on a
piece of paper as Orlando, still in the
hospital, began to prepare the book’s pref¬
ace. This passion is reflected throughout
the book.

The book’s purpose is to call the church
to holistic evangelization. Costas engages
in “a constructive, critical, contextual theo¬
logical reflection on evangelization as a
prophetic and apostolic task in the light of
Scripture as a prophetic and apostolic
text.”

Of interest to Anabaptist readers is
Costas’ claim that the book is informed by
a radical evangelical tradition with roots in
the Anabaptist emphasis on evangelical
ethics. It is also “informed by the experi¬
ence of oppressed racial minority Chris¬
tians in North America who are in
solidarity with other oppressed groups and

poor minorities of the two thirds world.”

This book represents Costas’ final minis¬
try to those engaged in global mission and
is recommended for reading to missionaries,
missiologists, and mission administrators.

Erwin Rempel is executive secretary of the
Commission on Overseas Mission for the
General Conference Mennonite Church, lo¬
cated in Newton, Kansas.

Health , the Bible and the Church: Biblical
Perspectives on Health and Healing. By
Dr. Daniel E. Fountain. Wheaton, IL: Billy
Graham Center, Wheaton College, 1989,
228 pp., (pb)

Reviewed by Jake Friesen

Dr. Daniel E. Fountain holds an M.D.
degree from the University of Rochester
School of Medicine and a Masters of Public
Health from Johns Hopkins University. He
and his wife, Miriam, have served at the
Vanga Evangelical Hospital in Zaire since
1961.

The stated purpose of this monograph is
to contrast the secular and biblical
worldview of our current practices of med¬
icine and health; to study important principles
of the biblical faith and their implications for
Christian ministries of health and healing; to
discover how to communicate effectively these
principles to those who hold the worldview of
another cultural perspective; and to plan strat¬
egies for the church to promote health and
healing.

He accomplishes these purposes well by
developing a theology of wellness that in
many ways rebukes his own profession and
at the same time summons churches to
recover their rightful role as partners with
physicians in working toward God’s plan of
wholeness for themselves and those
around them. Local congregations are en¬
couraged to develop a ministry of healing
based on solid biblical foundations with a
concern for the whole person.

The book challenges readers to rethink
today’s assumptions and practices of med¬
ical services both at home and abroad; it
should be read by every Christian physi¬
cian, health worker, and those interested
in health issues and concerns.

Jake Friesen, a medical doctor now in pri¬
vate practice in Reedley, California, was a
medical missionary in India from 1952-72.

65

An African Tree of Life. Thomas G.
Christensen. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books,
1990, 184 pp., $17.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Jacob A. Loewen

Thomas G. Christensen is a Lutheran mis¬
sionary to the Gbaya and professor at the
theological school in Meiganga, Cameroon.
This volume (ASM #14) is based on his
doctoral dissertation presented at the Lu¬
theran School of Theology in Chicago in
1984. It represents a welcome model of con¬
textualizing the message of salvation through
Jesus Christ in a West African society.

Central to much of Gbaya ritual in initi¬
ation, purification, reconciliation, and con¬
secration is the sore tree, which the people
call “our sore-cool-making-thing.” Its
branches placed between combatants, in¬
dividual or collective, stop their aggression.
Sore leaves in water are sure to remove
evil, ill will, revenge, etc. Best of all, Gbaya
Christians now call Jesus “our sore- cool-
making-thing.”

This study is a virtual sandwich with the
first and the last two chapters dealing with
contextual application and the “meat”
being the ethnographic description of
Gbaya ritual (ch. 4-11).

The value of the book lies in its sympa¬
thetic treatment of Gbaya ritual—albeit,
largely through Gbaya Christian eyes—the
openness it manifests in helping Gbaya
Christians contextualize the gospel, and
finally, in its appeal to sending churches to
develop their own new metaphors and
rituals to make the Christ of the gospels as
relevant to their technological society as
the sore metaphors have made God to the
Gbaya.

From Abbotsford , British Columbia, Jacob
A. Loewen is a retired missionary and
translation consultant.

Doing Theology with the Masai. By Doug
Priest, Jr. Pasadena, CA: William Carey
Library, 1990, 240 pp., $10.95 (pb)

Reviewed by David W. Shenk

Doing Theology with the Masai (also
spelled Maasai) is a quest for the contex-
tualization of the Maasai approach to sac¬
rifice. For ten years, Doug Priest’s family
served with the Christian Missionary Fel¬
lowship among the Maasai in Tanzania and
Kenya. A critical question they struggled

66

with was the extent to which traditional
sacrificial practices could be expressed
within the Christian community. This book
attempts to answer that question.

To me, the strongest chapters are those
describing Maasai sacrificial practices and
their symbols. Those chapters present sig¬
nificant data that will be helpful to any
missionary attempting to understand the
Maasai. It is also a valuable anthropological
contribution. A specific awareness of con¬
temporary anthropological research into
the phenomenon of sacrifice would have
strengthened the book.

Priest differentiates between the Old
Testament sacrifices that could be classi¬
fied as negative (atonement for sin) or
positive (thanksgiving), and applies it to
the Maasai sacrificial system. He concludes
that any sacrifices related to atonement
should be terminated by Maasai who be¬
come Christians, because Christ is the final
sacrifice. Sacrifices of thanksgiving may
continue providing there is no mediational
priest involved, because Christ is our high
priest.

The issues raised are pertinent, and per¬
haps Priest’s conclusions are correct. How¬
ever, the hermeneutic and ecclesiology
leading to these conclusions troubles me.
The opening statement of the book indi¬
cates that Priest’s perceptions are juxta¬
posed against those of a Maasai pastor who
has served his people many years. That
pastor feels that Christian Maasai cannot
participate in any part of the sacrificial
system. Priest disagrees, and this book is a
defense of his position.

There is little evidence that Priest’s con¬
clusions have developed out of a vigorous
hermeneutic within the believing Maasai
community. Only several references indi¬
cate conversations of these issues with the
Maasai believers. There is no indicated
awareness of the hermeneutic which other
churches in other societies within Kenya
have engaged in in relation to the sacrifi¬
cial system, nor is there acknowledgment
that in earlier years hundreds of Kenyan
Christians died as martyrs for refusing to
participate in traditional sacrificial systems.
Why did they feel so deeply about non¬
participation that they would lay down
their lives?

I would have enjoyed more theologizing.
The sacrificial system unlocks the key to
the worldview of a people at a profound
level. The descriptive passages are intri¬
guing and most valuable. Yet the book does
not really open the door into the
worldview behind those sacrifices. How¬
ever, Priest’s book can be a valuable first
step in understanding the significance of a

sacrificial system among a people who are
turning toward Christ.

Previously a missionary in Somalia and
Kenya , David W. Shenk is now Director of
Overseas Ministries for Eastern Mennonite
Board of Missions, Salunga, Pennsylvania.

The Quiet Revolution: The Story of a
Living Faith Around the World. Edited by
Robin Keeley. Grand Rapids: Wm. B.
Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1989, 384 pp.,
$16.95 (pb)

Reviewed by Hans Kasdorf

This is another volume in the Handbook
Series created by Lion Publishing. An in¬
ternational team of editors have enlisted
63 contributors to give an up-to-date por¬
trait of the Christian movement that is truly
global in scope, content, and interpreta¬
tion.

The book has three sections: part one
treats larger Christian denominations as
families or communions; part two describes
Christianity on six continents; part three
deals with the theoretical aspects of the
Christian faith and how it is most appro¬
priately disseminated and applied.

While the editors attempt to present a
historical overview of the worldwide
church, their approach to history is
missiological and universal, rather than
strictly historical and Western. Those look¬
ing for church history must look elsewhere;
those looking for a kaleidoscope of con¬
temporary expressions of Christian faith
will find this book helpful.

Teachers and students of mission history,
world Christianity, and missiology will use
this as a reference book for its wealth of
current information on the church in the
global village, with its unique opportunities
and challenges, crises and chaos. A general
index, maps, charts, diagrams, and colored
photographs add to its value and strength.

As one reviewer notes: “During the last
generation a quiet revolution has been
taking place. A faith once dominated by
Westerners has taken off into Africa, Asia,
and Latin America.” Such is the nature of
Christianity—it is “a dynamic faith, ever
growing and spreading throughout the
world.”

Hans Kasdorf is Professor of World Mission
at Mennonite Brethren Biblical Seminary,
Fresno, California.

MISSION FOCUS INDEX

Volume IS (1990)

Besides an alphabetical author listing, this
index is divided into two main subject
categories: (A) General Missions and (B)
Area Studies. Each subject entry is listed
by author, title, and Mission Focus volume
number and issue. In addition, each entry
is assigned a number in italic for ease in
cross-referencing. Please note that this index
continues the indexes for volumes 1-10 found
in the December 1982 issue; thereafter up¬
dated in the December issue of each volume
of Mission Focus.

Author Index

FRIESEN, Albert. The Missionary and
Music; 18:4, 239.

GRABER, David. Experiencing Native
American Music: Living with Cheyenne
and Crow Indians; 18:4, 243.

GREEN, Stanley W. Anabaptism and Ec-
clesiology in a Context of Plurality; 18:2,
233.

JANTZ, Hugo. Old and New Possibilities
for Mission in Eastern Europe; 18:1,
228.

KRABILL, James. William Wade Harris
(1860-1929): African Evangelist and
“Ethnohymnologist”; 18:4, 241.

KREIDER, Alan. The Growth of the Early
Church: Reflections on Recent Litera¬
ture; 18:3, 235.

LIECHTY, Joseph. Missionaries and Social
Change; 18:3, 236.

OYER, Mary. Evolving African Hymnody;
18:4, 240.

RAMSEYER, Robert. Sixteenth-Century
Insights and Contemporary Reality: Re¬
flections on Thirty-Five Years in Mis¬
sion; 18:2, 232.

RINDZINSKI, Milka How My Understand¬
ing of Mission Has Developed; 18:2, 234.

SCHMIDT, Henry J. How My Understand¬
ing of Mission Has Developed; 18:3,
237.

SHENK, N. Gerald. Not a Vacuum But a
Drought: Faith Amid Crisis in Socialism;
18:1, 227.

STUTZMAN, Linford. An Incarnational
Approach to Mission in Modern Affluent
Societies; 18:1, 229.

WALLS, A. F. Conversion and Christian
Continuity; 18:2, 231.

WENGER, Malcolm. Sing to the Lord a
New Song; 18:4, 242.

ZIMMERMAN, Earl. Perspective on Mis¬
sion from Matthew s Gospel; 18:1, 230.

A. GENERAL MISSIONS

HISTORY AND THEOLOGY OF MISSION

Anabaptist Theology of Mission

GREEN, Stanley W. Anabaptism and Ec-
clesiology in a Context of Plurality; 18:2,
233.

RAMSEYER, Robert. Sixteenth-Century
Insights and Contemporary Reality: Re¬
flections on Thirty-Five Years in Mis¬
sion; 18:2, 232.

Conversion

WALLS, A. F. Conversion and Christian
Continuity; 18:2, 231.

History of Mission

KREIDER, Alan. The Growth of the Early
Church: Reflections on Recent Litera¬
ture; 18:3, 235.

Mission in the Bible

ZIMMERMAN, Earl. Perspective on Mis¬
sion from Matthew’s Gospel; 18:1, 230.

ENVIRONMENT, SOCIETY, AND
DEVELOPMENT

Culture and Anthropology

FRIESEN, Albert. The Missionary and
Music; 18:4, 239.

GRABER, David. Experiencing Native
American Music: Living with Cheyenne
and Crow Indians; 18:4, 243.

KRABILL, James. William Wade Harris
(1860-1929): African Evangelist and
“Ethnohymnologist”; 18:4, 241.

OYER, Mary. Evolving African Hymnody;
18:4, 240.

WENGER, Malcolm. Sing to the Lord a
New Song; 18:4, 242.

Social Order, Social Change

LIECHTY, Joseph. Missionaries and Social
Change; 18:3, 236.

SHENK, N. Gerald. Not a Vacuum But a
Drought: Faith Amid Crisis in Socialism;
18:1, 227.

FORMS OF MINISTRY AND WITNESS

Missions and the Missionary

FRIESEN, Albert. The Missionary and
Music; 18:4, 239.

LIECHTY, Joseph. Missionaries and Social
Change; 18:3, 236.

RAMSEYER, Robert. Sixteenth-Century
Insights and Contemporary Reality: Re¬
flections on Thirty-Five Years in Mis¬
sion; 18:2, 232.

RINDZINSKI, Milka. How My Under¬
standing of Mission Has Developed;
18:2, 234.

SCHMIDT, Henry J. How My Understand¬
ing of Mission Has Developed; 18:3,
237.

Strategy for Missions

JANTZ, Hugh. Old and New Possibilities
for Mission in Eastern Europe; 18:1,
228.

Structure of the Church for Mission

STUTZMAN, Linford. An Incarnational
Approach to Mission in Modern Affluent
Societies; 18:1, 229.

Worship, Liturgy, Prayer

FRIESEN, Albert. The Missionary and
Music; 18:4, 239.

GRABER, David. Experiencing Native
American Music: Living with Cheyenne
and Crow Indians; 18:4, 243.

KRABILL, James. William Wade Harris
(1860-1929): African Evangelist and
“Ethnohymnologist”; 18:4; 241.

OYER, Mary. Evolving African Hymnody;
18:4, 240.

WENGER, Malcolm. Sing to the Lord a
New Song; 18:4, 242.

B. AREA STUDIES

AFRICA

OYER, Mary. Evolving African Hymnody;
18:4, 240.

Ivory Coast

KRABILL, James. William Wade Harris
(1860-1929): African Evangelist and
“Ethnohymnologist”; 18:4, 241.

EUROPE

Eastern Europe

JANTZ, Hugh. Old and New Possibilities
for Mission in Eastern Europe; 18:1,
228.

SHENK, N. Gerald. Not a Vacuum But a
Drought: Faith Amid Crisis in Socialism;
18:1, 227.

NORTH AMERICA

Native Americans

GRABER, David. Experiencing Native
American Music: Living with Cheyenne
and Crow Indians; 18:4, 242.
WENGER, Malcolm. Sing to the Lord a
New Song; 18:4, 242.

67

Editorial

Having recently worked through a manuscript on the
concept of culture in Protestant missions by Charles R.
Taber has impressed on me the multiple dimensions of
the Christian mission. Even though missionaries may focus
their efforts on a specific task—i.e., preaching the gos¬
pel—their presence and impact can touch many aspects
of life, often in ways never anticipated. Taber observes
that all people operated with a pre-critical understanding
of culture prior to the nineteenth century. There were no
conceptual tools available before that time. Only in the
nineteenth century did people begin to speak about
culture as an abstraction and begin to develop theories
and tools of cultural analysis that would enable compara¬
tive and analytical studies. Prior to this time every group
of people the world over thought of themselves as having
culture and other people as being culturally deficient.

This change in outlook was aided and abetted by several
developments. A major reason for this change was the
Western military, economic, political, and cultural inser¬
tion in other cultures worldwide from the sixteenth
century onward. The sheer change in the frequency and
range of intercultural contact was bound to pose new
questions.

A second contributor to this change in perspective was
the modern missionary movement. In contrast to other
aspects of the Western movement throughout the world,
the Christian mission had at the center of its purpose
personal transformation, which it assumed would be man¬
ifested in all aspects of life. Soldiers or merchants or
settlers entertained no such ideas. They either pursued a
policy of minimal interference with the local culture, as
in the case of military expeditions, or assumed displace¬
ment of local peoples and their folkways, as in the case of
settlers. What is often criticized in missionary practice can
be traced to the fact that missionaries operated with the
only known models and without the benefit of critical
understandings.

By 1850, more and more missionaries and mission
leaders were aware of the wrongness of this approach.

Out of this awareness came insistence on the importance
of the indigenous culture, indigenous church, and vernac¬
ular languages. This insight did not, to be sure, produce
instant results. It had to be worked out in one area after
the other. In retrospect, the pace seems to have been
unconscionably slow, and there were setbacks along the
way.

One of the areas in which there was relatively late
recognition of its importance for the development of the
church in loco was liturgy and music. Yet today, as we
observe the church in all its manifestations in specific
cultures throughout the world, we notice that one of the
most profound and reliable indicators that a particular
church has struck root in the soil and heart of a people is
the extent to which that church sings its faith in Jesus
Christ using indigenous materials. A church which con¬
tinues to rely on translated music usually has not fully
internalized the Christian message. As Albert Friesen
shows, there were pioneers who saw the importance of
this early on, but their examples and challenges were
generally ignored.

The story of the Dida people, guided by the Prophet
Harris, is highly unusual, as James Krabill shows. In this
instance, an indigenous church from the beginning used
only indigenous materials as the medium for expressing
their newly-adopted Christian faith. This has led to a
prolific production of music among the Dida Harrist
Church. The path followed by American Indian Christians
has been much slower, as both Malcolm Wenger and
David Graber show. Mary Oyer provides us with some
useful general observations from the viewpoint of one who
moved from a project in ethnohymnody among her own
people—the North American Mennonites—to ethnomu-
sicology in various parts of Africa, including African
varieties of ethnohymnody. Taken together, these authors
provide sufficient material to prod us all to think afresh
about the faith/culture issue, especially in terms of music
as a major element in Christian worship.

—Wilbert R. Shenk

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